Mike Dodds has addressed the speculation surrounding Ron-Thorben Hoffmann, with many claiming he had been sent back to Bayern Munich. The interim coach also explained his decision to leave Jermain Defoe on the bench for so long...
HOFF
"Thorben has not gone back to Germany, I can confirm that. Unfortunately Hoff he has been for some blood tests, and we're just waiting on the results of that."
PATTO
"We felt that Anthony Patterson had trained really, really well so I don't want to take the focus away from him, an academy boy who had earned that opportunity to play and who deserved the opportunity to play."
GOOCH
"Lynden picked up a little bit of a knock in Saturday's game. He trained on Monday but it was still feeling tight, so we decided to leave him out."
DEFOE
"I totally understand the clamour for Jermain, because he has got quality. But he has only played nine minutes of football so far this season."
CAREFUL
"We have a duty of care to him, to get him up to speed. We've got to be very careful with him, that we don't throw him in too quickly, too early, otherwise he will be at risk of getting injured. That's the reality. There's got to be a level of protection around him."
