DUDLEY Kingswinford RFC have been rocked by the news star centre Stefan Shillingford is out for the rest of the season.

The youngster injured his anterior cruciate ligament and damaged his shoulder during DK’s 26-14 defeat at Sutton Coldfield on December 19.

Joint head coach Neil Shillingford admitted losing the centre would be a “massive” blow but believes the club has the players to step in and cover.

He said: “We will miss Stefan but these things happen in rugby.

“When you are in pre-season you plan for all eventualities. We have a lot of good players and now is the chance for someone else to step up.”

The club are also assessing injuries sustained by Pete Knight, Andy McEwan and Robbie Jones during the game, which took place on a half frozen pitch.

DK were forced to play nearly the entire second half with 14 men but Shillingford refused to blame the defeat, or the injuries, on the conditions.

He said: “The pitch in my view was right on the edge of being playable.

“Their players didn’t seem too keen to play but we did the warm up and our lads were happy to go ahead with it.

“We just had a terrible first half and fell behind, then the injuries became a factor and we couldn’t catch up.

“We played poorly, I don’t think the pitch had anything to do with it.

“It was a shame as the win would have put us back in the middle of the promotion race.”

Victory would have catapulted DK into second spot in the Midlands One West table but instead they slipped to fourth, one place behind Sutton Coldfield.

The loss brought an end to a run of four straight league victories and capped off a mixed first half to the season, which has seen some great performances blighted by disappointing losses at Stratford, Walsall and Whitchurch.

Shillingford is looking for greater consistency in the second half of the campaign, with DK set to face promotion rivals Walsall and Bournville in the next few weeks.

He said: “We had a very good pre-season and started full of confidence but a few bad results really knocked us back.

“There have been some really good performances and its about reaching that level on a more consistent basis.

“We have good strength in depth in the forward line but have suffered a few injuries across the backs.

“There are some big games coming up but we can’t think too far ahead, we have to focus one game at a time.” DK are next in league action on Saturday January 9 when they take on Walsall at Heathbrook.

Top right: Stefan Shillingford on charges through the Sutton line during DK’s 26-14 defeat, the centre left the game injured.