Ipswich Town defender Axel Tuanzebe out ‘long term’ after almost losing thumb, confirms Kieran McKenna while Dara O’Shea faces fitness test for Everton

Ipswich Town manager Kieran McKenna says Axel Tuanzebe will be out for ‘around a few months’ having undergone hand surgery and revealed Dara O’Shea will be assessed ahead of Saturday’s home game against Everton (3pm) due to a back injury.

It came amid updates also being given on the fitness of Jens Cajuste, Massimo Luongo, Ali Al-Hamadi and Cieran Slicker at this afternoon’s pre-match press conference ahead of the Suffolk side returning to Premier League action following the season’s second international break.

Tuanzebe missed the West Ham match having cut his hand on a broken glass while washing up, a freak accident which required surgery with the defender having been in danger of losing his thumb.

“Some of the details came out of how he did it, it was a household accident, very unfortunate but very, very serious, very close to losing his thumb,” McKenna said.

“He’s had surgery to repair the tendons and everything in the thumb that was damaged, he’s recovering from that surgery now, I think the recovery’s going pretty well, but it’s a long-term injury.

“As much as it seems like a pretty innocuous body part in the game of football, it’s a pretty important body part in human anatomy and he needs to let it recover.

“Of course, he’s a loss and a miss, it shows how quickly things can change in football and in life.

“Thankfully, he’s recovering well and we have to adapt and improve as a team and we look forward to having him back when he’s ready again.”

Asked how long the 26-year-old DR Congo international might be sidelined for, he added: “It’s not definitely set yet. It could be anything from a few months, maybe a little bit less if the recovery goes well and that’s something we’re in dialogue with different specialists on.”

Regarding Cajuste (knee) and Luongo (ankle), he added: “Jens is not fit yet but will hopefully train with the group next week or have some part to play next week.

“Massimo picked up an injury in the Aston Villa game, so he’s also unavailable for this game and probably for the next period of games, and we have some other issues as well that we’re assessing currently and seeing where we’re at going into the weekend and beyond.”

Al-Hamadi missed out on international duty with Iraq having undergone treatment on an adductor issue on which he underwent surgery early in the summer.

“Ali missed the international break, had a further injection in his groin area, it’s been a really complicated injury and issue for him,” McKenna, no stranger to injuries in that area during his own playing career, continued.

“Of course, when you have an injury in that area, it isn’t always necessarily one site, it’s a really small margin between what classifies as a hernia, an adductor, a hip flexor, deep abdominal muscle, hip joint, there’s a lot of things in that.

“He’s doing OK, he’s been back training in the last couple of days. We hope now he’ll get a really clear run at it, he has been training but he’s probably not been fully free of pain as he’d like to be, but he’s felt good over these last few days and he’s available for tomorrow, if we need him and he’s hopefully going to get a run now over the next couple of weeks of training well with a clean bill of health, which will make him in a stronger position.”

O’Shea was subbed while playing for the Republic of Ireland and McKenna confirmed that that was do do with a fitness problem.

“He had an issue in his back that is having to be assessed, so we’ll have to see how that goes over the next couple of days,” he said.

Keeper Slicker is on the way back from his hand injury: “Cieran Slicker’s not with the group, he’s I think just starting some handling work with the medical team, so I think he’s another few weeks away.”

Broadhead minutes please Town boss

McKenna was pleased to see Nathan Broadhead play his first competitive football of the season as a sub for Wales as they beat Montenegro 1-0 in midweek having suffered a hamstring injury in July.

“It was good to see him get some minutes,” McKenna added. “He’s trained now for a couple of weeks, is training well and not having any problems

“He knows there’s big depth in the forward positions at the moment and we’ve pretty much a clean bill of health in those areas, so he’s coming from behind in terms of missing the whole pre-season and not having had any games, but he’s getting stronger with the training and we know the qualities that he can bring when the opportunity comes, which I’m sure it will do.”