Manning offers update on whereabouts of Brandon Mason

Defender Brandon Mason is still adapting to the rigeours of first team football but Liam Manning has been satisfied with how his latest signing is progressing.

The 24-year-old added to Dons’ squad in March after being released by Coventry City last summer but is yet to kick a ball or even be named on the bench for his new team.

After spending a long period out of the game, Manning said Mason has still got to get used to the group environment again, having spent several months training by himself but was handed a setback this week, with illness keeping him out of action.

“Brandon has been a bit ill this week,” Manning confirmed. “He had been doing bits and pieces of training before he got here.

“His levels were really starting to improve, he was readjusting to the team environment and the consistency of the demands we were putting on him, and that was improving a lot in the short time he'd been here. But he fell ill last weekend and missed this week.”

Despite not having a lot of cover in either wing-back position following injuries to Tennai Watson and Aden Baldwin, the form of Daniel Harvie and Kaine Kesler-Hayden has meant there has been little need for Mason thus far.

Manning said: “Competition is high, any healthy group and team has to have competition. People need someone pushing them and we've got that.

“I wouldn't say we're fortunate in that sense because it's calculated, but we've got a group who are all in.”