City boss Phil Parkinson has admitted that Nahki Wells is unlikely to feature against Rochdale this weekend following the Bermudian striker's recent problems with illness.
Wells has been troubled with a stomach virus since last Friday and is still not completely fighting fit leading up to the visit of John Coleman's Dale to the Coral Windows Stadium.
To his credit, the Bermudian tried to make a successful recovery from the bug during the Boxing Day clash with Accrington Stanley two days ago, but he was forced off after still feeling the affects of the illness during the game.
This time around, Parkinson is keen to make sure the virus is completely out of Wells' system before unleashing his top-scorer back onto League 2 defences.
"Nahki is still not right," confirmed Parkinson.
"He came in and trained on Christmas Day and then said he felt fine on Boxing Day. He had managed to keep some food down and he said he felt his strength was up again.
"In hindsight looking at it now though, we probably should have told him just to have a couple more days rest.
"We could only make the call on what we were told at the time, but he wasn't quite ready to feature properly against Accrington.
"Learning from this now, we have to make sure he is completely right before we throw him back in now.
"With that in mind, I don't think he'll be with us for the weekend."
There is better news for Zavon Hines, however, with the attacker looking in contention for the Rochdale fixture despite being forced off against Accrington with an eye injury.
Defender Carl McHugh is a doubt still with a calf problem though, while Curtis Good is definitely out as he recovers from his own stomach bug.
Parkinson added: "Zavon is fine. Curtis is not back in training yet though."
"The bug that Curtis has is the same that a couple of the lads have had already. It doesn't seem a twenty-four hour thing either, it seems like it can take a good few days to get out of your system.
"We are keen to give him time to fully recover from it, plus we also don't want to run the risk of him possibly passing it onto one of the other lads."