MANAGER Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink has confirmed that club captain John Brayford could miss up to three months of action with a hamstring injury.
Brayford pulled up after just 10 seconds of our 1-1 draw at AFC Wimbledon last weekend and was forced off the pitch as a result.
“It’s not good,” confirmed Hasselbaink after our 4-2 Papa John’s Trophy defeat at home to Aston Villa U21s.
“He’s going to go to a specialist tomorrow (Wednesday), but it definitely looks like it’s going to be 8-10 weeks, and it may be three months.
“I said if John Brayford comes off, you know it’s serious. The good thing with him is he’s a quick healer.
“It’s not off the bone but it’s as bad as it could get.”
Hasselbaink was less than impressed with his Burton Albion side’s approach and mentality after going 2-0 up in our defeat to Villa.
The Brewers were in control and scored twice through Daniel Jebbison and Kane Hemmings, and were inches from a third when Conor Shaughnessy turned a close-range effort wide.
But a superb hat-trick and an assist from Cameron Archer condemned the Brewers to defeat and knocked Hasselbaink’s side out of the Papa John’s Trophy.
“We were in control - we scored two good goals from set pieces and we could have scored more,” said Hasselbaink.
“We had chances, we missed one sitter, but then it’s too easy, isn’t it? It comes too easy (for Villa).
“You think you’re good and that you can stroll through, you don’t have to do things 100% because we’ve already won.
“When that mentality creeps in, it’s hard to turn that around. We said that at half-time, we showed that and we got punished, and rightly so.
“If we go and press and we don’t do it right, we suffer at the back. It’s as simple as that.
“They’re all preventable, the goals. The boy that scores, Archer, is a quality player - he’s with the first team, he’s a Premier League player and you see the difference.
“Hopefully my players will learn from this that you can’t back down when you are on top.
“You stay on top by doing the things that got you in front. It’s a little bit like Saturday - we got in front and we went backwards, instead of going forwards.
“We need to learn from that.”