It certainly hasn't been an easy baptism to life in football management for Matt Taylor, but it seems he is about to have one of his first welcome headaches since taking over in the summer.

The City boss lost his captain, Jordan Moore-Taylor, and promising centre back Jordan Storey before the campaign had even begun, forcing him to look for recruits in areas he perhaps didn't want to last summer.

Injuries to Troy Brown and Hiram Boateng then deprived him of two key men for a prolonged spell of the season before top scorer and chief goal getter Jayden Stockley left for Preston North End in January.

All the while, frustrating injuries meant he has been without a fully fit squad virtually all season, culminating in defender Pierce Sweeney coming down with chicken pox two weeks ago.

Finally, there appears to be light at the end of the tunnel with Sweeney back in training, where he was joined by Lee Martin, who has missed the last six weeks or so with a calf problem.

To have both players back is great news for City, but given how the season has gone so far, Taylor won't be taking anything for granted.

"Pierce is available for the weekend, but he has only had three days training off the back of quite a serious illness, so he won’t be available to start," Taylor said.

"Lee Martin has had a couple of days training in and around the first team as well, so probably the same as Pierce in that it’s probably too soon to get game time at the weekend, but it’s certainly great to have him involved.

"He’s a character that we have missed at times this season and Pierce is the same."

Being without so many key men has certainly had an impact as City have struggled to get the same results they had earlier in the season.

"Like I said, we have good players coming back into the mix and that group from last week should be a week further on in terms of their physical development, which sounds stupid when you are three quarters of the way through the season!" Taylor added.

"But I still need players to get up to match speed pretty quickly. Hiram is still a work in progress, Troy (Brown) is a work in progress and even at the top end of the pitch, Ryan (Bowman), Donovan (Wilson) and Jono (Forte) have only been bit-part in the last month-month and a half.

"Getting 90 minutes out of people that I can trust is going to be important."

The City boss has openly talked about how he wants his team to develop and become a 'running team' and Martin was certainly key to that.

The former Manchester United youngster was in superb form when injury struck, so the hope is that he can get back to such form quickly.

"We spoke about him being a talisman in the couple of months around the Christmas period with his energy and his attitude and desire, which was absolutely fantastic," Taylor said.

"He’s a good player as well and he will hurt the opposition with his movement. We have spoken about his legs, but he has good end product as well, but I still want more from him in terms of in and around the opposition box.

"He’s been captain at previous clubs, he has a great character and personality and he is a presence on the training pitch and on the pitch as well."