Dean Smith Interview prior to this gameweek

I’m excited about the games.

“We look no further than Sheffield United.

“All of a sudden we’re playing two games on the spin where the teams (Sheffield United and Brentford) play three at the back.

“It will be a test tactically for ourselves and the coaching staff, but the players are looking forward to it.

We’ve had a period of adaptation.

“Nyland came out with an injury.

“Lovre came in and it takes a little while to adapt.

“I was really pleased he made two good saves and got his first clean sheet against Reading.

“His family are over now and he’s settled.

“That’s part and parcel of the adaptation.

James Chester injury

“He’s trained a couple of days this week.

“We’ll see how his knee is in the morning.

Elphick and Mings partnership

“Defensively they understood what they need to do.

“They gave us a really good base with Conor and Glenn in front of them.

“They were very organised and very vocal.

“Mings distribution was excellent.

When I took over it was difficult because we only had Chester and Tuanzebe as centre-backs.

“Axel got injured, only ended up with Chester, carrying an injury.

“I’m really pleased to have him back.

“His performances are steadily getting better and his best one was against Reading.

“Jack wants to get back as soon as possible, like we all want.

“It’s a very serious injury. A bone stress one. There’s a potential for a possible break.

“We needed to wrap him up in cotton wool.

“He was a bit disappointed that I didn’t watch his session yesterday because he’s out on the grass now.

“I made sure I did today!

“He’s showed me that he can strike a ball and run!

“It’s all about his loading now.

“The sooner we get him back the better because it will be like a £25m signing.

Other injuries

“Green is back and has trained all week.

“Henri isn’t quite there yet so he’s still with the medical staff. I haven’t got a time-frame on him.

Announce yourself now

“Every time you go into one of these big games and put in a good performance

you get announced as promotion contenders.

“I had it in the first eight games and I’ve had it since.

“There will be days when we aren’t promotion contenders at all.

“All we can do is go out there and try to win.



Tyrone Mings incident

“He’s been okay.

“He was disappoiinted for the lad. That’s the important thing.

“Everyone seems to have forgotten about Oliveira in all of this.

“One of the first people to him was Tyrone/

“He was interested to see how he was. He was disappointed to see the injury sustained but sometimes in contact sport accidents happen.

Convinced it was an accident?

“I am absolutely convinced (it wasn’t deliberate).

“Anyone who was at the game last week... I didn’t know what had happened on the sideline. Their bench didn’t appeal, nobody in the stadium appealed, none of their players appealed.

“The nearest person to the incident was the referee, five or six yards away.

“He deemed it an accident and played on.

“The one who stopped the play because he saw what had happened and felt what had happened was Tyrone.

“He stopped the game to make sure (Oliveira) was OK.

Reaction

“The reaction is because people look at the picture of his face after.

“They think I must have a look at that incident so they slow it down and freeze frame it.

“Any incident in a football game I could do the same and show you a potential accident.

“There is a potential accident in every game.

“If someone gets caught with an accidental elbow, they are going to keep showing that over and over again.