Sam Allardyce makes Ravel Morrison wait for West Ham debut

Devil in red: Ravel Morrison in his Manchester United playing days
11 April 2012

Ravel Morrison has been told he must wait for his West Ham debut as Sam Allardyce's men seek to go back to the top of the npower Championship table at Blackpool tonight.

Morrison has not featured for the Hammers since his £1million move from Manchester United in January and he is also unlikely to play at Bloomfield Road as Allardyce preaches patience.

Allardyce told the club's official website: "He is lacking in first-team experience at the moment and our position, with the necessity to gain automatic promotion, means it's a difficult team to break into.

"We have a wealth of top-quality, experienced players already available. Ravel will have to play a patient game and wait until it is the right time for us and him."

The Hammers will be without suspended pair Matt Taylor and Kevin Nolan and the injured Papa Bouba Diop, while Blackpool miss striker Gary Taylor-Fletcher and defender Alex Baptiste.

Birmingham boss Chris Hughton hopes to bring Marlon King back for his side's trip to Barnsley after the striker missed Saturday's FA Cup fifth-round draw at Chelsea with a groin injury.

Hughton is ready to take a risk on King, his club's top scorer with 11 goals, admitting: "Marlon has been training and although he is still not 100% I think he will be okay."

Barnsley boss Keith Hill could give a full debut
to 17-year-old midfielder Paul Digby with David Perkins definitely ruled out for three weeks with a hamstring injury.

Middlesbrough are without the suspended Kevin Thompson for their trip to Millwall, but Barry Robson returns to Tony Mowbray's squad after sitting out Boro's last three games with a dislocated finger.

The Lions have a doubt over keeper Steve Mildenhall who injured his ankle in the FA Cup loss to Bolton, but Jimmy Abou is fit again after a knee problem and is pushing for a place in Kenny Jackett's squad.

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in