Saints head up to Old Trafford this evening with an even worsening injury crisis, Ralph Hasenhuttl is playing his cards close to his chest on who is fit or not, but one thing is for certain, Saints will need a childminder on the bench.

At this moment in time it is hard to say who will be out injured this evening.

Mohammed Salisu, Nathan Tella, Michael Obafemi and Will Smallbone are all long term injuries and not available with Jannik Vestergaard and Kyle Walker Peters all likely to miss out as well.

But the real blow is that they have been joined on the injury list by Oriol Romeu, Theo Walcott & Ibrahima Diallo after Saturday's defeat to Aston Villa.

Walcott and Diallo were both struck down with that looked like hamstring or muscle injuries while Romeu's problem remains unknown.

If all of these players do not pass muster then Saints will have the following fit first teamers

Alex McCarthy

Jan Bednarek Jack Stephens Ryan Bertrand

Nathan Redmond Stuart Armstrong James Ward Prowse, Moussa Djenepo

Che Adams Danny Ings

This means we could just about scrape 10 fit first teamers and then we are struggling, Ralph Hasenhuttl will be praying that at least one of the wounded will be fit and he will therefore be able to slot someone in at right back.

Best hope for that Is Oriol Romeu who may just have felt a few strains after his return from injury on Saturday and hopefully will be ok now.

Speaking about injuries and the lack of a full-back, Hasenhuttl said:

"We are not so bad in that position as we have Will Ferry as an alternative on the bench if we need to.

“It looks like Jannik [Vestergaard] and [Mohammed] Salisu are coming back as soon as one week or two weeks. This is important as we will then have more options in the back four and Kyle-Walker Peters' is not a big injury.

He added: "It is getting better defensively and we have more alternatives."

In a week or so injuries will hopefully not be an issue for the Austrian, but for the moment it is a patched up side he will have to put out for the trip this evening.

In truth he could have done with the transfer window not ending until next Monday so he could have retained Valery or Vokins until then, but he has gambled that with injuries coming back in the next fortnight they would have been surplus to requirements.

One man who could benefit from the injury crisis is Alexandre Jankewitz, having just turned 19 the talented midfielder was being nurtured by the club, but the players agent was pushing him to go for a move to a club where he could get first team football now rather than wait.

This might be good in the short term but not in the long, however he can now have the chance to show Saints that he is the talent that some think and push his claims for first team action after his small cameos in both the Shrewsbury cup tie and Arsenal in the Premier League.

Ralph usually likes to play his cards close to his chest, hopefully at least one of the injured players will be fit enough to come in, if so we can put out a good starting XI but we will be short on the bench.

One feature though of Ralph's 2 years in the job has been his ability to bring in a youngster and get them to do a job and he will need to do that again tonight.

This will be a tough ask tonight whatever side we put out, it might not have a good ending, but we should take into account the injury issues and if things don't go right we dust ourselves down and go again.

Whatever the result it cannot be blamed on letting Yan Valery and Jake Vokins go on loan, they have barely featured in our Premier League season and once the wounded return they would find it hard to feature again, Ralph made the right decision in the long term letting them go on loan.

Photo: Action Images

DorsetIan added 14:40 - Feb 2 Will Ferry is the full back cover now? I don't think he's played a first team game yet and he is described as a pacey left wing attacker. Trying to suggest that we have got cover for our full backs, or that it's only an issue for another week (or are we guaranteed no more injuries or suspensions?) is complete madness.
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NewburySaint added 14:47 - Feb 2 As I soon as I saw yesterday who the officials were going to be-essentially a reverse of Saturday-I decided to give this game a miss-what an absolute joke they would be assigned to us after Saturday’s debacle. We all know what’s going to happen so should the sweep stake start here of not if but how many pens Utd will get tonight.....
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underweststand added 15:41 - Feb 2 Just looking at the United bench is enough of a challenge, but after the Liverpool win, and the FA Cup victory over Arsenal we see that anything can happen. For a while, some of us have highlighted that the front line was the real problem rather than the defence who were even keeping clean sheets. In the last 7 games (since the Man City defeat) we've had 68 shots, but scored only twice. At the end of last season Ings and Adams were almost scoring for fun, but now their luck has deserted them. If our defence can hold out against United and convert a few of those wasteful chances then we might get a result. On paper, we have one of the " least experienced" sides for many-a-season and the likelihood of 6 or 7 teenagers on the bench (who can hardly claim a dozen appearances between them) looks to be a real challenge. BUT this is the stuff of football, and if any of these youngsters comes in and DAJFU, makes a name for themselves, and the Academy will show everyone why they are there. IF we have one advantage it may be.. NOT having to play in front of 75,000 United fans.

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SanMarco added 16:34 - Feb 2 Interesting to read the debate on the full-backs. If KWP isn't fit for tonight then we basically have no RB and I therefore expect to see Djnepo there (bit of a red card waiting to happen vs Rashford and co). JWP can't play there because the rest of the defensive MF is out. Unless Romeu back I suppose but even then we needs those players to protect the defence in a game like this. This season has indeed been 'expect the unexpected' so who knows. Anything we get will certainly be a bonus.

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dirk_doone added 16:57 - Feb 2 We're up against stiff oppostion tonight: Mike Dean and Lee Mason will be looking to complete the double over us, and Mike Dean has already awarded Manchester United a record-breaking EIGHTEEN penalties so he'll want to add to that total.
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dirk_doone added 17:06 - Feb 2 If we want to win 1-0, we'll need to score 3 perfectly good goals, McCarthy will have to save a penalty awarded after the ball brushes against one of our player's legs outside the penalty area and we'll have to defend with only 10 men after Ward-Prowse is given a red card for smiling at the ref.
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aceofthebase added 17:08 - Feb 2 Ralph has gambled on letting Valery go. I think he has had a personal conflict with Valery for the last six months. RH stated well before the tx window closed that he could play Diallo there, obviously his mind was made up to remove Valery.
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