Grant Hanley has been ruled out of Norwich’s game against Southampton with a hamstring injury and it’s looking like he will be out for the rest of the season, according to Michael Bailey of The Athletic.

The news will come as a huge blow for Daniel Farke and the rest of the Norwich squad as they look to pull off a Great Escape.

The Canaries will restart the season rock bottom of the Premier League table, six points behind 17th-placed Watford, so they have it all to do if they want to stay in the top-flight next season.

However, they look like they’ll need to play their final nine games of the campaign without their club captain.

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With nine games to play in a relatively short space of time, the last thing Norwich needed was a defensive injury as rotation is going to be vital in terms of keeping players in the best shape to compete.

City have had huge issues at centre-back all season, in fact, Farke has never had all four of Hanley, Christoph Zimmermann, Ben Godfrey and Timm Klose fit at the same time all year and it looks like that trend will continue.

Farke will need to manage the remaining trio carefully through the nine league games plus the FA Cup fixtures as he can’t afford many more injuries if he wants to keep the Canaries flying in the Premier League.