New Charlton Athletic signing Mandela Egbo to miss start of League One season

Charlton full-back Mandela Egbo will miss the start of the League One season with the knee injury he suffered at Dartford on Saturday.

The former Crystal Palace defender initially felt he had only twisted his right knee.

But Addicks manager Ben Garner, speaking after a 4-2 friendly win at Colchester United tonight, revealed the setback was more serious.

“There’s a fairly significant injury to his knee, which is the big disappointment of pre-season so far,” said Garner.

“He’ll have a period of time out. He’ll see a specialist next week. We don’t think he’ll need an operation, we’re almost certain it won’t and it will just be a case of rehabbing him as quickly as possible.

‘He’s got a great attitude, he’s so positive – he’ll do everything possible to get back quickly. We’ll support him on and off the pitch.

“I never like to put a timeframe on it but he’ll certainly miss the start of the season.”

George Dobson played no part against the U’s.

Garner said: “George trained this morning and was just a little bit tight in one area. So for the sake of 15 minutes tonight it wasn’t worth it. It’s an opportunity for that to settle down so that he can train fully on Thursday and play on Saturday.

“The plan was one team to do the majority tonight and flip round [for this weekend at Sutton United]. They [the ones not starting] had a session and a gym session today – we’ll reverse that on Saturday. Everyone will get really good work and load into them.

Steven Sessegnon, signed on loan from Fulham last week, got his first minutes late on in tonight’s match.

Garner said: “He’ll have more involvement on Saturday. I think those first minutes are the hardest ones. Those 15 minutes it is hard to get up to the pace and get your second wind. Nice to get him involved, he’s obviously trained for a period now. Looking forward to him building more minutes as we move forward.”

PICTURE: KEITH GILLARD