MANAGER Steve Watson has axed plans to play a practice game this week because of York City's injury situation.

On paper, the coming weeks looked to be an ideal time to get minutes into fringe players - Saturday’s game against Southport was City’s 10th league fixture in five weeks amid a congested opening to the National League North season, but York are now not scheduled a midweek fixture until Boxing Day.

With this in mind, Watson had floated the idea of getting a team in this Tuesday to give youth team players on the cusp of the first team a run-out alongside senior players in need of minutes.

However, with the current injury situation, Watson said he could not risk it now.

Early-season casualties Paddy McLaughlin and Dan Maguire were joined in the treatment room by Steve McNulty two weeks ago, while striker Jordan Burrow was left out of Saturday’s squad with a calf injury. Josh King has missed the last two games, with fellow defenders Joe Tait - who played much of Saturday with a facial injury - and Sean Newton feeling the effects of the weekend’s game.

“We looked into it,” Watson said of the game, which would have taken place tomorrow. “But the Under-19s have a game on Wednesday so we would have had to use a mixture of our players and them.

“To be honest, we’ve got too many injuries to risk anybody in a competitive game.

“Even if you call a friendly a friendly, the lads on the pitch still go flat out.

“After the weekend, we’re carrying five injuries and got two or three knocks more. We’ll have a normal training schedule this week and I'll do a head count on Thursday.”