Frankie Musonda could make his long-awaited Raith Rovers return on Saturday following six months on the sidelines.
The 23-year-old was back in the match-day squad for Rovers’ stunning 3-1 victory at Kilmarnock last weekend.
However, Stark’s Park boss John McGlynn admits that was more to boost the player’s morale, rather than indicating a desire to pitch him into action at Rugby Park.
Nevertheless, Musonda has battled back manfully from a serious knee injury in April and, following another few days of training, is expected to be in contention to face East Fife in the SPFL Trust Trophy.
“It’s possible Frankie could feature against East Fife,” said McGlynn, who gave his players a couple of well-earned days off this week prior to returning to business on Wednesday.
“It was maybe a wee bit early for him to be on the bench at Kilmarnock — but it was a boost for him.
“Although we had four games in nine days and were not training much, he was with the other group [of players] who were training virtually all the time.
“He’s continued to work exceptionally hard and — as that’s progressed from day to day — I could see that he was getting a lot stronger.
“We’ll see how he comes through training on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday and if he can get some minutes; great. If not, there will be opportunities coming up.
“We’ll have a bounce game after the Arbroath match which will give him an opportunity.”
McKay minutes
Musonda’s timely return ensured McGlynn felt comfortable loaning defender Dave McKay to Edinburgh City until January.
Allied with James Keatings starting regularly for Montrose, McGlynn believes that is a win-win situation.
“Dave has been out for a long time and needed game-time,” continued McGlynn. “We knew that at some point along the line, someone would need to go out on loan.
“The [domestic loan] deadline was a little tight — we would have liked another week with Dave, in order to get Frankie back fully.
“But we felt we could take that chance.
“Dave got 90 minutes under his belt [against Cowdenbeath] last Friday night and if he continues to do that, come January we will have two more players — Dave and James Keatings — who will have played a lot of football.”
