Darnell Fisher's return a boost for Preston North End in two positions

Fisher has completed a three-match ban imposed by the FA for grabbing the genital area of Sheffield Wednesday’s Callum Paterson last month.

He is free to play against Middlesbrough at Deepdale tomorrow night (7pm) and that will release Alan Browne to go into midfield in place of the injured Ben Pearson.

As expected, the news wasn’t good on the ankle injury suffered by Pearson against Wycombe.

A scan showed up ligament damage in his left ankle and he is facing a ‘reasonable period’ on the sidelines according to PNE manager Alex Neil.

An exact timescale was not forthcoming from Neil but it is expected to be a few weeks.

During Fisher’s absence, Neil had to make-do-and-mend. With no full-backs available for the Watford game, he went with a 3-5-2 system using wing-backs.

For last week’s victory at Bournemouth and against Wycombe, Browne played at right-back in a 4-2-3-1.

With Pearson ruled out and Daniel Johnson suspended for the Boro game, having Browne available in midfield allows Neil to put some round pegs in round holes.

Neil said: “Darnell coming back frees-up Alan to give us another option in the middle.

“When Ben went off on Saturday, normally I would have had Alan’s combativeness in there.

“But he was having to play at right-back and it was quite difficult to plug that gap because we didn’t have that type of midfielder.

“Having Darnell back will obviously be a boost defensively too because we’ve been extremely light in the full-back areas.”

Pearson’s ankle injury won’t need surgery, with time being the great healer.

But it is a second big injury blow in less than a week, with Patrick Bauer out for the rest of the season with a damaged Achilles tendon.

Neil said: “With Ben’s injury there is nothing you can do to stop it.

“It wasn’t a fatigue injury or him playing too much. I’ve watched it back, Ben was just running and then all of a sudden his foot seems to buckle underneath him.

“I think he is just very unfortunate and we seem to be unfortunate at the moment with these injuries.

“When you look at it, in less than 45 minutes of football we have lost Pat Bauer for the season and Ben with an ankle injury for a reasonable period of time.

“Ben doesn’t need an operation, it’s an injury will be conservatively managed.

“It’s about how quickly he can heal, everyone is different with injuries.”

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