Why Rav van den Berg and Ben Doak missed Middlesbrough's defeat to Coventry City

Rav van den Berg and Ben Doak both missed Middlesbrough's defeat to Coventry City through injury - though Doak's issue is not believed to be serious.

The pair were both absent from the Boro squad at the Riverside for the clash with Coventry on Saturday, as Boro lost 3-0 after Hayden Hackney received an early red card. Liverpool loanee Doak was particularly a miss for Boro as Isaiah Jones struggled to make an impression in a game where, especially after going down to ten men, Boro needed more of a counter-attacking threat.

Speaking after the game, Carrick explained: "Unfortunately Rav felt his knee in training in the last day or so, so he misses out today. We'll have to wait and see [on the severity]. Ben is more of a fatigue thing. His hamstring was a bit tight. We've tried to manage him a bit.

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"He missed a few months towards the end of last season, he's not played an awful lot of football and he's played the last eight games in a row, including Scotland games. We knew we had to be careful with him. He just felt it ever so slightly, maybe Tuesday he'll be OK, we'll have to wait and see. It's not major."

The third change Carrick made for the Coventry game saw Luke Ayling make an immediate return to the starting line-up at the expense of Anfernee Dijksteel. Matt Clarke and Isaiah Jones came into the side for the injured duo.

With the two dropping out of the squad, Dael Fry came back into the squad for the first time this season, having completed 45 minutes for the under-21s last week. However, after playing two second-string games, there was still no return to the bench for Marcus Forss. George McCormick was the second new player in the squad from last weekend's draw at Norwich City.