The door remains open for former Bristol City youngster Ayman Benarous to earn a deal at Swindon Town after his summer trial.
Swindon remain intent on adding another attacking option before the end of the transfer window on September 1, to help replace the injured Fletcher Holman, who will likely not be available until the middle of December at the earliest.
Ian Holloway presently has Aaron Drinan, Ollie Palmer, Joseph Hungbo, Paul Glatzel, Joe Snowdon, Jaylan Pearman, and Louis Millard available to him in forward areas.
The idea will be to secure one more player to complement that group ahead of the deadline, with Kain Adom and Danny Butterworth both under consideration at present, although Town are still evaluating their options.
The issue that both Adom and Butterworth have is that they are returning from long-term injuries, with the Burton Albion man working his way back from a broken leg and Butterworth has not played since October after twice having to have surgery on a ruptured hamstring.
Another player who remains in the mix is Benarous, who heavily impressed on trial against Forest Green Rovers and comes with strong reviews from Bristol City and Plymouth Argyle.
In the friendly against the National League side, Holloway felt that the 23-year-old fitted very nicely into Swindon’s team.
The issue came as he went down injured with a shoulder issue right at the end of the first half, and he has been recovering from that over the last month.
Holloway said that he would be interested in inviting Benarous back to training once his shoulder had healed, and whilst that has not happened yet, he did not rule it out when asked ahead of the trip to Oldham Athletic.
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He said: “I am not sure, he's still injured. It is his shoulder. And would it pop out again? I don't know.”
The likelihood is that Benarous would be a fallback option if Swindon cannot secure the options they are looking at to be their new forward before the end of the window.
Butterworth would also be the preference in terms of out-of-contract players who do not need to sign before Tuesday; however, Holloway has expressed his nerves at bringing him in when he is already dealing with injury issues.
He said: “I'm hoping upon hope that he can prove that he might be able to, because if he can’t, I need someone now. So we're racing against time all the time with it.”
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