Callum Paterson to miss rest of season with injury as Neil Warnock slams Iceland manager

Neil Warnock has confirmed Callum Paterson will miss the rest of the season with an ankle injury and slammed Iceland for their management of Aron Gunnarsson during the international break.

Paterson requires an operation on the ankle he injured during Scotland's win over San Marino and Warnock's injury problems deepened even further after Matthew Connolly suffered a major setback.

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"Callum is having an operation on Monday and should be out until pre-season," said the Cardiff manager.

"It's a big blow. On the same day [Matthew] Connolly was just coming back training as well and he dislocated his ankle.

"Contrary to what was said before the Scottish game, I never spoke to Alex [McLeish] about him not playing on the plastic pitch [in Kazakhstan]; he's had such a bad injury to his knee in the last 12 months, I think they spoke between themselves.

"But the second game [against San Marino] was a disaster for us."

Warnock described the above two injuries as "one of those things" but was incensed by Iceland playing Gunnarsson in both of their European Qualifiers against Andorra and France.

"Originally I was told they weren't going to play Aron on the plastic pitch for the first game [against Andorra]; he played for over an hour," said Warnock.

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"And then he plays against France for 93 minutes. I can't understand that at all really.

"I know it's a new manager (Erik Hamren took charge after last year's World Cup), you want to do well, but when you're 3-0 down with 80 minutes gone, surely you can substitute a player.

"I bent over backwards for Iceland last season to allow him to go to the World Cup, gave him a new contract, and he had three months this season where he was out. We had to build him back up.

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"I was disappointed with the Iceland manager. I'll be speaking to him later today (Friday) as well."

Warnock added: "I think that was pure selfishness and am so disappointed in Iceland for doing that."

Despite the injury setbacks, Warnock has been delighted by the attitude of his players in training as they prepare for two tough fixtures in four days.

Cardiff are at home to Chelsea on Sunday and travel to Manchester City on Wednesday, with both games live on Sky Sports Premier League.

"We've got to try and stay in with these two difficult games and hope that other teams help us as well," he said.

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"We don't want to be too far adrift for the last six games. It's not just Burnley and Southampton, I think there another one or two nervous teams above because you can lose four or five games at this level.

"I don't feel like we're under pressure because everybody knows we should be down there.

"Training has upped to another level, two sessions this week have been the best since I've been at the club. And we haven't had the international lads either.

"All credit to the lads for the way they've trained. I felt like a young manager, that the future is bright for me."

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