Barnsley: Good news for star striker

BARNSLEY head coach Paul Heckingbottom has confirmed that former Doncaster Rovers goalkeeper Thorsten Stuckmann is training at the club - but has stressed that he will not be offered a deal.
Sam WinnallSam Winnall
Sam Winnall

The big German stopper left Rovers earlier this summer in the wake of the club’s relegation to League Two, with the Reds having offered to help him out by allowing him to train at the club to maintain his fitness levels in his quest to find future employers.

Heckingbottom said: “He came in training and is a free agent now. We initially did have a look at him, but we did tell him we were not in a position of giving him anything. But we offered him the chance of keeping to come training with us.

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“He is a great bloke; we are helping him out and he is helping us out as another ‘body’ with an extra keeper in training.”

Sam WinnallSam Winnall
Sam Winnall

Meanwhile, Heckingbottom, whose side welcome Derby in their Championship home opener at Oakwell on Saturday, says that he is hopeful that Sam Winnall will be back before the end of the month after coming off early on in last weekend’s opening-day loss at Ipswich Town with a hamstring problem.

He said: “Hopefully, we will have him back before the end of August.

“My fear straightaway when he pulled up was that he had some sort of tear. But the MRI scan has shown no sort of tear, but mircofibre (damage) which is grade one, which is good.

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“Sam has had that injury before. He said if it was in the past and he was younger that he would have played on. But he knows now that he is not going to put himself out for the case of months and he knew expect how it was and he has has done it.”