Only Sam Nombe and Aaron Collins are fit in MK Dons’ attacking cordon

The lack of attacking options available to Paul Warne is of real concern to the head coach after MK Dons drew a blank against Blackpool on Tuesday night.

The side will have played four times in ten days by this time next week, with a trip to Stevenage and the rearranged game against Bromley coming after matches against Luton and Blackpool.

With only Sam Nombe and tops-scorer Aaron Collins fit to lead the line at the moment, in the absence of last season’s leading marksman Callum Paterson and Rushian Hepburn-Murphy, Dons are lacking alternatives coming off the bench to offer something new up top.

During Tuesday night’s 2-0 defeat to Blackpool at Bloomfield Road, Ben Wiles was arguably Dons’ only attacking threat, but he has only one goal to his name this season, coming in the EFL Trophy win over League Two side Crawley Town. Prior to that, his last goal was in April.

Paterson is set to return to training with the side on Thursday, having been missing in action since the middle of September, and Warne said it cannot come soon enough, with so much reliance on Nombe and Collins to do so much of Dons’ heavy lifting.

“Rush is still a few weeks away, Pato is close, he will be back in the training group on Thursday,” Warne confirmed. “We need something to energise the group. Pato is a leader on and off the pitch.

“Games are won by goals and strikers, and we keep having to play the same two players and that’s not conducive to amazing performances each week. We’d just like to have some more legs back in the team and hopefully that will happen in the next few weeks.

“I’m not blaming injuries, but we keep having to roll out the same two up top, and they’re playing 90 minutes constantly, it’s just exhausting. They press, they work hard, I can’t knock them for that.

“But Blackpool could change their front line - they took two good ones off and brought two good ones on. We could just do with a bit more energy at the top of the pitch.

“We had a lot of midfielders and two wing-backs (on the bench). It would be nice, obviously, if I had Pato and Rush - two different people to throw on would’ve been handy. We can’t cry about it, but we have to get the best out of the group we can.”

Despite his lack of options though, Warne admitted his side did not do enough to force the issues against the Seasiders, adding: “In the important moments, when you want your players to pick the right pass, to pick the right cross, we didn’t do that. It’s something we have to address.

“We have to be more ruthless in the final third. We’re not missing a lot of chances, but we’re not being clean enough to give ourselves a chance to win.”