Bradford City boss Graham Alexander cops two-match Easter ban plus fitness update ahead of League Two game with Notts County

Alexander picked up a sixth booking of the campaign in last weekend’s loss at Swindon for his protests shortly after Richie Smallwood’s dismissal in the 5-4 loss at the County Ground.

Captain Smallwood will also watch on from the stands in the home game with Notts on Thursday and the trip to face the Spireites on Easter Monday. He will also miss the key White Rose derby with promotion rivals Doncaster Rovers on Saturday week.

Meanwhile, several City players who have been struggling with illness symptoms are continuing to be monitored ahead of the Notts match.

George Lapslie and Aden Baldwin missed last weekend’s game at Swindon and Alex Pattison came off at the break after feeling under the weather.

Alexander said: “It was still about at the start of this week and we’ve got a couple of the boys in today for the first time to see how they are and we will assess them again in the morning and we need to leave it as long as possible because we want as many players available as possible.

"There’s a few who have missed a couple of days, unfortunately and that’s from last week and the weekend.

"There were three or four and we will just assess them. But they have all attended training today, which is a positive. But being match day minus one, it’s a light session and we just need to give them another 24 hours, eating right, sleeping, drinking and all that sort of thing and see if they have replenished the energy they have probably lost.

"It has hit different people at different levels, some harder than others. We will assess that in the morning.”