Neil Adams insists the ball is now in Sebastien Bassong's court with Norwich City's ex-captain a notable omission from the Canaries' opening pre-season 1-0 weekend win at Dereham.

Bassong played 60 minutes for the development set-up in a 3-1 defeat at Boston United, with Adams opting not to include the Cameroon international in the 21-man squad who travelled to Aldiss Park.

Adams revealed the central defender has been training with the club's younger talent and the 28-year-old played no part in Adams' short-term stint towards the end of last season, but the City chief is not calling time on his Carrow Road career.

'He is our player and if we feel we need to use him then we will,' he said. 'He has trained and played with the development squad so far, but he is our player. There is nobody who is going at the minute, but it is my job to manage the squad and do that for every situation. Seb played at Boston and I will speak to the coaches to see how he has done and we'll take it from there.'

Ricky van Wolfswinkel, Wes Hoolahan, Anthony Pilkington and Martin Olsson also missed the Dereham win, but the quartet are expected to return for Tuesday's Braintree trip. Adams also confirmed Swedish international Olsson did not require summer shoulder surgery after struggling with the problem for the second half of City's Premier League campaign.

'Ricky is fine. He didn't train on Friday but he trained on Saturday with the rest of those lads,' said Adams. 'Martin is looking sharp. He has not had to go and get the surgery on his shoulder. He had a family illness, which we don't obviously need to go into, but he was given a little bit of extra time off and he is back with us now and he is fine. He is just a little bit behind the squad but he will be at Braintree.'