DARLINGTON will make changes for today’s game at Ashton United, enforced and otherwise, with Simon Ainge moving from attack to defence.

He began his career as a centre-back and rolled back the years in the second half on Saturday, being one of the team’s few bright points of deeply disappointing display.

Quakers lost 3-0 to Altrincham at Blackwell Meadows, a game that saw Tommy Wright lose Terry Galbraith and Dom Collins to injury, leading to Ainge shifting from centre-forward to centre-back.

With Joe Wheatley suspended and Alex Henshall injured, as well Galbraith and Collins, Wright has little room for manoeuvre in terms of team selection, but Dave Syers and Harvey Saunders come into the reckoning.

Jack Vaulks is unavailable after being sent on loan to Whitby, where Wright hopes the defender will benefit from playing regularly.

Wright said: “There’ll be changes made. I need to digest it, I need to look at Saturday’s game again and look at Ashton.

“Monday is about how the lads respond and how they look after themselves at the weekend because we need a reaction now.”

On putting Ainge at the heart of defence, Wright added: “He will already know that he’ll have to play there without me having to tell him, but he was brought to this club to be a centre-forward.

“He understands that two centre-halves are injured so will have to go and fill a gap there.

“His performance in the second half was one of the better ones, but you miss a hell of a lot going forward without him up front.

“We had to reshuffle and had to put a centre-forward at centre-half and he took to it like a duck to water, heading the ball 30 yards. It’s been a while since I saw a proper centre-half performance like that.”

Darlington’s second-half showing was marginally better than the first, though a factor was that Altrincham had the points effectively won from the hour mark when it was 3-0.

Wright added: “We played more football, it was brighter, we had chances and their keeper made a couple of good saves. But the reality is I’m clutching straws because we lost 3-0.”

Ashton drew 2-2 at Southport on Saturday having led 2-0 after 14 minutes. They are 16th, one place and one point better off than Darlington, having also scored ten and conceded 15.