WANDERERS are sweating on the fitness of Eoin Toal for the long trip to Exeter City this weekend.

The Northern Ireland international had to pull out of the reckoning on New Year’s Day at Mansfield after reporting an issue with his hamstring.

Toal had been out since late October with the injury and only made his playing return against Lincoln, managing an hour before being replaced by Will Forrester.

But the reaction was suitably serious to see Wanderers take no risks at Field Mill, where a 2-1 defeat ensured they start 2025 in 10th spot in the table, five points outside the play-offs.

Ian Evatt also confirmed that Luke Southwood had replaced Nathan Baxter in goal because of the broken nose he had received in the second half on Sunday.

He said: “Nathan took a heavy knock and the one thing we had last season was when Nathan got injured and hurt, our other goalkeepers weren’t really up to speed with the lack of game time. Luke has been doing really well, he has played really well, and we felt it was the right time to rotate.”

Evatt felt his side had been dominant at Mansfield, stating after the final whistle that there had “not been a lot wrong” with the performance overall.

The pressure on both the manager and the players to get back into the promotion chase, however, ensured that there was little sympathy on offer from either the 1,700 who travelled on New Year’s Day or the wider fanbase.

Asked whether he accepted the view would be different from the outside after an eighth league defeat of the season, he said: “People only want results and this is a results business, I understand that. In terms of our general performance nobody could say it was a bad performance. We had complete dominance against a team that is difficult to play against.

“All we can do is look at it and try and improve. It is very frustrating for everyone involved and we are going to have to respond again.”

Wanderers have looked vulnerable from set pieces and crosses at various stages of this season and though they showed some improvement in the pre-Christmas draw at Wycombe, the same issues raised their head at Mansfield.

“We haven’t defended our box well enough at times,” Evatt said. “The frustration for me was that the first one was a simple throw in set-up that we don’t get right. These are things we speak about every single day, they know it off by heart, they know all the answers. But they have to do the right things when the time comes and for that first goal we just didn’t, we got punished.”

The manner of the second goal at Mansfield was also a cause for concern, although Evatt maintains it boiled down to more than Lee Gregory outwitting Ricardo Santos with the final touch.

“We had the chance to control the turnover and George (Thomason) gave it away,” he said. “We knew they would play in behind quickly and we didn’t react to it and we got punished. We have been severely punished in a game we had complete control of.”