Luke Bolton is back playing regular football for Mansfield Town after a lengthy absence through injury and illness.

The 26-year-old is back in action for Stags but is still building his match fitness up, having missed all of pre-season.

Bolton’s luck with injury has been poor since his move to Mansfield last summer from Wrexham. After making just six appearances in his debut season, he was forced to the side-lines to recover from a groin injury and since then, he’s struggled to maintain a regular status within the team.

Bolton was forced off early against Wycombe Wanderers last September and did not feature for 14 games as he recovered from his groin problem.

Luke Bolton and Baily Cargill applaud the travelling fans at the end of the English League Cup second round between Everton and Mansfield Town at Hill Dickinson Stadium on August 27, 2025. (Photo by Paul ELLIS / AFP)

placeholder image — Luke Bolton and Baily Cargill applaud the travelling fans at the end of the English League Cup second round between Everton and Mansfield Town at Hill Dickinson Stadium on August 27, 2025. (Photo by Paul ELLIS / AFP)

He made his return against Bolton Wanderers at the end of December and made mostly cameo appearances after that, until featuring in back-to-back starts in February against Peterborough and Blackpool.

Just weeks later, Bolton started against Rotherham but was forced off the pitch 13 minutes into the match after requiring treatment. It was then confirmed he had suffered a calf injury, which kept him out for the remainder of the season.

After missing Stags’ impressive push to finish tenth in League One, Bolton worked his way back to match fitness but hit another significant roadblock with his health.

In July, he was rushed into hospital with appendicitis and had been recovering from that throughout the summer. At the end of August, it was confirmed that he had finally started his pre-season schedule.

During Nigel Clough’s press conference ahead of the Burton Albion game, he touched on Bolton’s injury journey and stressed that the focus is on him getting minutes under his belt to build up his fitness.

“He’s missed the whole of pre-season so he’s now in the process of trying to catch up and doing a mini pre-season, in the midst getting minutes and training regularly with everybody else as well. It’s a catch-up process for him,” the manager said.

“It’s very difficult when you miss pre-season. He started his eight weeks after everybody else but he’s getting there and I think we’re seeing that in some of his performances. In the next few weeks, hopefully he won’t be far off.

“He’s trying to mirror what the first team did, which is tough when you’ve got games. The only reason we can do that volume of work during pre-season is because there are no games to worry about. So we’ve got to factor that in with him as well.

“But he’s been fit now all during the summer, it was just the appendicitis that kept him out, it wasn’t an injury.”