Boss Fergie confident Posh will handle the pressure of playing league one catch-up

And he admits that his team are going to have to be ready and be able to handle the pressure of playing catch-up once their campaign resumes.

Positive Covid-19 tests in the Posh camp last week led to the club postponing three games to allow the infected players to recover, and for the rest of the first team squad to self-isolate.

Saturday’s scheduled Sky Bet League One date with Ipswich Town was the first to go, with the EFL also postponing the Boxing Day trip to Gillingham and the December 29 Weston Homes Stadium showdown with Charlton Athletic.

On Saturday alone, Posh dropped from third to fifth as they were leapfrogged by Lincoln City and Doncaster Rovers. With two more rounds to be played, it is more or less certain Ferguson’s men will have dropped further down the pecking order by the time they play Donny in their next scheduled match on Saturday, January 2.

“We can’t do anything about it,” admitted the Posh boss. “We will slip down the table, but teams did also drop points at the weekend.

“Doncaster play again (they host Shrewsbury on Tuesday), so they could be six points if not more ahead of us when we play the game on January the 2nd.

“We are a little off where we want to be, but we are still in mix and we will still be in the mix with games in hand when we return.

"So yeah, there is frustration to be honest, but there is nothing to do.”

Posh still have a minimum of 29 fixtures to squeeze into what will be the final 18 weeks of the season, with the campaign due to end on May 8.

It doesn’t leave a lot of room for for error or more call-offs and means the current three-match suspension is far from ideal, but Ferguson believes the club made the right decision to act as it did.

“We need to fit the games in, and work with the EFL on it,” he said. “We are going to have a busy schedule, but it helped us last time, when we had a break.

“We made the right decision and in the end, the Ipswich game would have been off anyway as they announced they had positive tests the following day.

“I think it is frustration, but this is going to happen throughout the season, hopefully not for us, but there will be disruption because of the nature of the world. We just have to make sure that when we come back we are ready.”

Ferguson is also confident his squad is strong enough and deep enough to deal with any fixture rush, although he hinted the squad may go through something of a refresher when the transfer window opens in January.

Asked if he believes his squad can cope, Ferguson said: “Yeah, I think we have good numbers.

“We have some stuff to do in January in and out, but we have a strong squad.

“Joe Ward should be fit and back for the Doncaster game, and Dan Butler has had a bit of time fitness wise to get up to speed.

“But there will be potentially one in and one or two out (in January). We will see what happens.”