Portsmouth devastated by right-back injury crisis in latest blow to Danny Cowley's promotion ambition

Zak Swanson collected a stomach injury in last weekend’s FA Cup win over MK Dons which booked a third-round trip to Spurs.

He joins long-time absentee Joe Rafferty on the injury list, who could be out until March after undergoing a second operation this summer.

In addition, it has emerged Kieron Freeman came off in the 67th minute at Ipswich in last month’s Papa John’s Trophy triumph with a calf injury.

With the trio unavailable for Wycombe, Cowley instead named Owen Dale in an unfamiliar right wing-back role in the 2-0 defeat.

And Cowley is unsure when the right-back crisis will clear up.

He told The News: ‘I don’t think we had any choice in terms of systems, Zak Swanson picked up a stomach injury against MK Dons.

‘We have three right-backs injured, there was no choice in terms of systems.

‘I don’t know how long Zak will be out for, he tried to train at the back end of this week, but it wasn’t right and he wasn't involved.

‘Kieron Freeman picked up a calf injury at Ipswich, so he’s missing as well.

‘Owen Dale played right wing-back instead, that was our solution, we had no right-backs available.

‘But I don’t want to get caught up in excuses, I want to just concentrate on the performance – and we were well short.’

For Adams Park, Cowley stuck with the wing-back system which brought a 3-2 victory over MK Dons last time out.

Yet, on this occasion, the dreadful Blues were well beaten by Gareth Ainsworth’s men.

He added: ‘People say systems but sometimes individually we just have to do our jobs better than we did.

‘The way Wycombe play, it’s a man-to-man style, so you actually have to win your individual battle and in the first half we didn’t win enough individual battles.

‘That was the truth of it.’