Injury state of play as Nottingham Forest return to action against Blackpool

The business end of the season starts here, with Nottingham Forest heading into their final 10 games looking to seal a top-six finish.

They return from the international break with a trip to Blackpool this weekend. And they head into Saturday's lunchtime clash sitting three points below the play-off places.

Boss Steve Cooper will hope to have some key players back for the run-in. Here's a look at Forest's injury state of play ahead of taking on the Seasiders.

Ankle sprain.

Forest's top scorer suffered an ankle sprain in the 2-1 defeat at Cardiff City in January which left him having to be helped off the pitch and leaving the ground in a protective boot. However, he did not have to undergo surgery, as had initially been feared. It was expected to keep him out of action for two months, putting a possible return at around early April. He returned to training this week, although the clash at Bloomfield Road might come too soon.

“Lewis has been back in training in the last couple of days,” Cooper said ahead of Blackpool. “Obviously we have to be careful with him, because he had quite a bad ankle injury.

“It’s great to see him. He’s the captain and is one of the senior players. Hopefully he features soon.

“Maybe Saturday comes a bit too soon. We’ve got a lot of games coming up and we have to manage players as individuals very carefully; they are all at different stages, some have played a lot of games and some have played very little, so we very much have to focus on individual programmes.

“Lewis’ is that he’s returning from injury. When the other boys return from injury as well, we’ll have to be careful with them.

“He’s looking sharp, I have to say. And it’s great he’s back. It’s given everybody a little bit of a boost,