Ruaidhri Higgins has revealed Ryan Schofield is set for surgery in another major injury blow for Coleraine ahead of their Premiership title bid.

The Bannsiders are set to be without captain Mark Coyle for most of the season after he ruptured his ACL during last week’s European defeat in Helsinki, and goalkeeper Schofield will now also be out of action for a period of time.

Schofield made 17 Premiership appearances during his maiden Irish League campaign last term and played a starring role in Coleraine’s Irish Cup final triumph over Dungannon Swifts.

The former Huddersfield Town shot-stopper sustained a facial injury in training as Coleraine prepared for Thursday’s Conference League second qualifying round second leg against HJK – the Finnish outfit won 3-0 at Inver Park to secure an 8-0 aggregate triumph.

placeholder image — Coleraine manager Ruaidhri Higgins. (Photo by Desmond Loughery/Pacemaker Press)

Higgins is also dealing with a number of defensive injuries – Cameron Stewart and Aidan Wilson missed the match – while Charles Dunne hasn’t re-signed with Coleraine after his contract expired at the end of last season.

With full focus now on winning Coleraine’s first Gibson Cup crown since 1974, Higgins has acknowledged he needs to reinforce his squad ahead of next weekend’s trip to Dungannon Swifts.

"That's the big one for us this year (winning the league), we're not going to shy away from it,” Higgins told the club’s media channel. “We have a league championship to try and attack.

"We have openly said that, but talk is cheap, we have to go and action it and put in really good performances.

"We know we are light in defensive areas at the minute, we know that.

"Ryan Schofield has to undergo an operation in the next 24 hours, he took a bad knock to his face in training (on Wednesday) so that's another one in that defensive area of the pitch.

"We know we're down numbers. If you look at centre-backs who have left the from club last season, our current centre-backs are injured, and we need to fix that problem over the next week or so.

"You can see a lot of our attacking play up to that last bit was very good and we'll be fine, I have no doubt about it, and physically we will go into next week's game in good condition because we have played two games against high-level opposition.”

Coleraine were back in Europe for the first time in five years this summer, banking more than €500,000 in prize money.

Higgins has said he’s “a big believer in summer football” and feels a calendar switch would help Irish League clubs pick up positive results.

"We've learnt a lot,” he added. “First of all, you need absolutely everyone fit and available and in peak condition.

"It's of zero benefit to us that European football is part of pre-season, it hurts Irish League clubs, there's no getting away from it.

"We got punished for every mistake we made.

"If you look at some of our play over the course of the two legs, and it sounds mental saying it after getting hammered the way we did, some of our play was brilliant. They were ruthless and clinical and we weren't."