Leigh Leopards head coach Adrian Lam has shared an injury update on David Armstrong and also confirmed that the club have recalled winger Keanan Brand after veteran Josh Charnley picked up a knock last week.
Brand, who has been injured for the majority of the season, had been sent out on loan to Castleford Tigers alongside Lazarus Vaalepu and Ben McNamara, where the aim was for the outside back to find some fitness.
Speaking to Serious About Rugby League just last week, Lam confirmed that Brand needed to ‘play some big minutes’ as he also noted that the outside back knows as well as anyone how quick things can change, noting: “You don’t know when that call’s going to come.”
The call has now been made with Brand recalled back to Leigh and he could even play this weekend after Josh Charnley and Umyla Hanley both picked up knocks in the loss to Huddersfield.
Speaking today [Tuesday] to the media ahead of Friday’s crunch game against St Helens, Lam said: “They both [Charnley and Hanley] trained today, which was good, which is a positive sign, and so did Davey Armstrong.
“Keanan Brand’s in the mix and in the picture. Matty Davis didn’t play last week. He’s in the picture, so there’s a few players that are there or thereabouts. We’ll settle on the 17 on captain’s run.”
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Leigh Leopards to make late call on Davey Armstrong
Much of whether Brand plays will come down to the fitness of Davey Armstrong, who missed out last week with a knee injury that he’d picked up in the first half of the heavy win over Bradford Bulls.
On Armstrong’s chances of playing on Friday, Lam said: “I’m going to give him up to kick off to be ready for that. There won’t be too many changes to the side, to be honest with you.
“I think I’m the type of coach, when you perform like that, I like to give players an opportunity to respond from that and fix up what we did wrong. That’ll probably be the case again.
“[There will] maybe be one or two players I can consider that can come onto the bench or to make a change, someone to make us better, but we’ll wait and see how that unfolds.”
Brand is of course one of those players who could be considered for the bench, or possibly even a start at full-back, as Lam confirmed that the outside back is in contention to feature.
The head coach explained: “Obviously, with Davey Armstrong the way he is and Gaz O’Brien at full-back and who also can cover half, I just need someone who can cover the outside backs that we’ve some doubt over – Umyla and Josh Charnley, as you’ve mentioned before.
“Players like Keanan are key players for us. He’s missed a lot of game time this year through being injured. I think he can bring us a little bit of X-factor, whether it be on that right edge or on that left edge. We’ll see what happens then.”
