Steve Cotterill: Matthew Pennington's return a bonus

Shrewsbury lost 1-0 to the Addicks at Montgomery Waters Meadow, a defeat that ended their winning run in the league, which started back in August. But Salop had lots of chances to go ahead in the game, and perhaps were unfortunate to end up on the losing team.

The boss was a disappointed figure at full-time, but he did admit the return of Pennington was one of the only positives out of the day.

He said: “That was a bonus one for us to be able to get Penno back out on the field, and by then the game had slowed down a little bit.

“So, therefore, there aren’t many sudden movements that can affect the groin again. I suppose that was one bonus that he has gone on and had 15 minutes or so.”

The defender went off in Town’s victory over MK Dons two weeks ago.

Soft tissue injuries can sometimes mean an extended period on the sideline, so when Cotterill revealed the damage was not too concerning it was a boost for Town with the fixtures they have coming up.

Julien Dacosta also warmed up with the squad at the weekend as he continues to come back from a minor groin problem.

Meanwhile, Marko Marosi says that the ‘hard work never stops’ and Town are motivated to keep improving on the training pitch.

Similar to Town, Marosi has had a good start to the season, making several important saves.

And he says his teammates are always trying to push themselves to be better regardless of their impressive start to the season as they currently sit in 10th. He said: “The hard work never stops, we want to be improving every day on the training pitch, and we have got a lot to learn.

“We have a lot to work on, and we just concentrate on ourselves.

“We have been working on everything, there are always things you can improve on, and you learn from in-game. We just concentrate on each game as it comes, and we try and get a positive result in every game we play.”