Three more could return for MK Dons for the run-in

While there is still a week to go before the transfer window closes, MK Dons are set to see three players return to the fold in a couple of months.

Kane Wilson has been absent since August, while Nathaniel Mendez-Laing and Will Collar both suffered hamstring injuries in December, but all three are on course to return in around six weeks, something which former Derby County man Wilson has dubbed the ‘March transfer window’.

With Dons already bringing in three players this month, Rushian Hepburn-Murphy and Joe Tomlinson on the brink of returns and the aforementioned trio still set to come back, reinforcements are set to arrive at ideal times for head coach Paul Warne.

“If we get through the window and not sign anyone else, but in a few months you can give me Nat, Kane Wilson and Will Collar, I’d obviously take it,” he said.

“Kane joked that we’ve got a really good March transfer window this year because we’ll have him, Mendez and Collar back, which will be good.”

Wilson was handed positive news last week from his knee surgeon, meaning a return to running on the grass is imminent, while for Mendez-Laing, Warne admitted the Guatemalan is enduring the ups and downs of a long-term injury.

Warne said: “Kane has been given good news from the knee surgeon that we can start to kick on now. I’m hoping he can be on the grass sooner rather than later. Obviously, then he has a lot of work to do to get match fit.

“(Mendez is) coming along with the injury really well. He looks a bit down in the dumps, you go through phases. There is the initial disappointment, then you have the joys of coming back into the building, but then more disappointment when training starts, everyone leaves the physio room and leaves you on your own.

“Knowing Nat the way I do, he loves nothing more than exciting people, running past them, scoring and setting up goals and that’s been taken off him. He’s not used to that, he’s not used to being injured. He’s not had many long-term injuries.

“Obviously he wants to be fit, he wants to play and wants to play a part in the rest of the season.

“From my point of view, that’s what you want from your players. I want them to have a drive to get back.”