Walsall blow as defender suffers setback in injury recovery

Defender Burke has not featured since October 4 against Bristol Rovers when he picked up the injury and has now had a "relapse" on the issue, boss Mat Sadler revealed.

The 23-year-old is sidelined for Sunday's FA Cup tie at non-league Gateshead and is not forecast to make a return to the Saddlers fold until the new year.

"We've had some illness in the camp so hopefully they fix themselves up over the next 24 hours," Sadler said in his press conference on Friday.

"Burkey won't be back. He's had a little bit of a relapse on that where he'll probably look like he'll be out for the next month now. It hasn't healed in the way that we wanted it to.

"He's had an injection this week to hopefully get on top of that and he'll just go through the rehab process again now. So he's really disappointed with that. So that's disappointing from our point of view."

The Saddlers welcomed midfielder Jamie Jellis back from an abdominal issue in Tuesday's EFL Trophy progress at Stevenage and Sadler confirmed Jellis is back in contention for a start.

"Jamie's back, he played half a game on Tuesday night as you saw, Jamie's ready for a selection," Sadler said. "He's another good one to add into our collection of eight midfield players that we want to play."

Striker Aaron Pressley has not played since November 15 owing to a hamstring issue and is unlikely to featured against the Heed.

"Aaron Pressley is on his way back. Will he be fit for Sunday? Probably not. We'll have to see how he is," the head coach added. "They're the only two I think now with Jamie being back out there. So touch wood. That's how it remains."