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Gianfranco Zola reveals a number of injured players return for Newcastle including top striker

7 years ago
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Gianfranco Zola is desperate for any positive news.

Many Birmingham fans want him sacked and with only two wins in 18 games (all competitions) since bizarrely sacking Gary Rowett, he needs a victory from somewhere.

At his press conference today, Gianfranco Zola revealed that he had some good news, with a number of injured players now available.

The main news was that last season’s top scorer, Clayton Donaldson, was now ready to be involved.

Only five Championship clubs have scored less than Birmingham’s paltry 38 goals this season and in the last 15 matches, they have managed to score more than one goal on only a single occasion.

In comparison Newcastle have scored 70 goals, 32 more than tomorrow’s opponents.

The 33 year old Clayton Donaldson has scored a decent 32 goals in 97 league starts (plus 7 as a sub) since he joined the Blues from Brentford.

However, after scoring 6 goals in 15 starts (3 as sub) he was injured only days after starting the Newcastle match at St James Park back in December.

With a couple of Birmingham’s development squad games now behind him he is ready to come back into the first team picture.

Birmingham were woeful when Newcastle smashed them 4-0 at St James Park and little better when both teams put very weakened sides out in the FA Cup replay.

The first cup game at St Andrew’s saw a below strength Newcastle side maybe a little fortunate to come away with a 1-1 draw after a really poor second half.

Gianfranco Zola:

“Clayton Donaldson will be in the squad tomorrow (for Newcastle match) which is very good news.

“He is much better and catching up (in terms of fitness).

“It’s just about finding the right moment to put him back in the team. Also, Jacques Maghoma will be included in the squad.

“Keita trained this morning, so he is fit in terms of medical fitness, but in terms of condition I don’t know because he didn’t train for most of the week so I will decide tomorrow.

“Jonathan Grounds did very well and I was pleased with his performance, so there is a strong possibility he will be back in the position again.”

“Michael Morrison went in for a minor bout of surgery this week after complications following an initial groin operation, it has set him back another week or so on the road to recovery.”

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