Sunderland manager Phil Parkinson has revealed that striker Charlie Wyke could return to the side when they face Bristol Rovers at the Memorial Stadium on Tuesday night.

Wyke missed his side's 2-2 draw with Gillingham on Saturday afternoon with a back problem, with January signing Kyle Lafferty coming into the side in place of the 27-year-old and netting both of the Black Cats' goals in the game, in what was the Northern Irishman's first start for the club.

Now however, it seems as though Parkinson could having something of a selection headache on his hands, as speaking after that draw to provide an update on Wyke, the Sunderland boss said: “Charlie has had a bit of problem with his back, so we decided to get it sorted this week.

“He probably could have carried on through to the Blackpool game but it’s getting to a stage where we felt we should do the injection this week and hopefully he will be ok for the week coming up.

“It’s not a major problem and he has a good chance of being in contention on Tuesday night."

Explaining why the problem ultimately kept Wyke out the clash with Gillingham, Parkinson continued: “It’s an ongoing thing.

“It was ok before Coventry, at the beginning of the week he wasn’t too bad, but as the week has gone on it wasn’t getting much better.

“With painkillers we could have asked him to get through this game but with Kyle and Will Grigg available we just thought it was better to get it dealt with and hopefully we will reap the benefit of that.”

So far this season, Wyke has scored five goals in 26 league appearances for Sunderland, who are now fifth in the League One table, three points adrift of the automatic promotion places with nine games left to play this season.

The Verdict

This looks like it could present an interesting conundrum for Parkinson.

So far this season, he has been pretty loyal to Wyke in keeping him in the starting XI whenever he has been able to do so, despite his far from prolific goals return.

However, with Lafferty making such an immediate and significant impact for the Black Cats against Gillingham, it could be hard for Parkinson to justify dropping him from the side for someone who has seemingly struggled in front of goal this season.

Indeed, with promotion so important to Sunderland this season, this is clearly a huge call for Parkinson to make, since ensuring the goals continue to flow will obviously be crucial to those hopes of securing a place back in the Championship over the next few months.