Birmingham City injury update as John Eustace confirms two players will miss Championship opener with Luton Town

Birmingham City will be without Gary Gardner and Harlee Dean for their Championship opener away at Luton Town on Saturday with a number of others still having a questionable mark over their head.

Dion Sanderson was on the receiving end of a bad knock in the final pre-season fixture with Rayo Vallecano but is recovering well whilst Lukas Jutkiewicz and George Friend are both hoped to be in contention.

Nico Gordon remains a little behind the rest and has not yet returned to training but could come in with a shout before the end of the week.

Young duo George Hall and Ryan Stirk will also be unavailable for selection for the trip to the Hatters but manager John Eustace is hoping to have them back at the start of next week.

Speaking ahead of the contest, Eustace gave a full fitness update ahead of the trip to Kenilworth Road.

“Dion’s doing well with the medical team,” he explained. “We’ll see how he is at the end of the week but apart from that, everyone else is ok.

“Jukey and Friendy are back in the group. Nico hopefully will be joining in soon as well, so yeah.

“Gary is probably about a week or so away, hopefully touch wood and Harlee’s the same, about a week away as well.

“Hopefully in the next couple of weeks, we’ll have everyone back.”