An injury to midfielder Rob O’Brien has seriously affected manager Simon Collins’ plans and is worse than first thought.

Collins revealed this week that O’Brien will be out for at least three months after breaking a metatarsal. The club’s supporters will also find their expectations dampened by the news.

Collins was keen to get the midfielder to stay at the club following the departure of last season’s boss John Deacey and a significant cut to the playing budget.

O’Brien did stay loyal to the club and other influential players such as James Knowles, Martin Drury, Luke Gibson and, of course, player-coach Simon Baldry also committed themselves.

Collins said: “Everyone knows what these metatarsal injuries are like after the ones David Beckham and Wayne Rooney suffered.

“It doesn’t matter which toe, or whose toe, it still takes the same amount of time to knit back together.

“It is not good losing any player with an injury, especially a long-term one, but to be without Rob for 12 weeks is really disappointing.

“He can run the middle of the park for you when he is on his game and always leads by example. We could have done with him last Saturday because I don’t think Harrogate Town would have beaten us by that score (5-1) if Rob had been in the side.”

With so many changes to the squad over the close season, O’Brien is one of the lynchpins for Collins. He featured prominently in a lot of the systems the new manager and his assistant Chris Billy tried over the friendly fixtures.

O’Brien played in his usual central midfield role, as a link behind a lone striker and as the base of a diamond formation with Baldry playing just behind a front two.

It was obvious O’Brien was an integral part of Collins’ plans but now it looks as though the season will be at least a third over before the player even returns to training.

Yet Collins remains upbeat, heartened no doubt by his squad bouncing back from the heavy loss to Harrogate to give a strong Leeds United squad a good game on Wednesday night.

Collins said: “We have a squad of players and I believe it is a very good one, so we will get on with it and be ready for next Saturday’s league starter.

“Having one player out will not mean we have to scrap any of the various formations we have been working on during the friendlies.

“If you have intelligent players and clear instructions, you can play a system – or switch to another during a game – to suit any situation.”