DEFENDER Brian Saah is confident that he can take up where he left off nearly three months ago when Torquay United face promotion rivals Shrewsbury Town at Plainmoor on Saturday.

Centre-back Saah was entitled to be more disappointed than most when last Saturday's game away to Rotherham United was called off.

The former Leyton Orient and Cambridge United man was poised to take the departed Chris Robertson's place at the Don Valley Stadium.

It was back on November 19 when Saah picked up what turned out to be a nasty groin injury in the first half of United's 3-1 home win over Plymouth Argyle.

So when this Saturday's match against Shrewsbury comes around, it will be 84 days since that day against Argyle.

And, deliberately pulled out of recent games against Willand and Forest Green Rovers, Saah will have had just one reserve outing, a 3-2 defeat by AFC Bournemouth in the totesport.com Combination, as a 'warm-up'.

But Saah, 25, said: "I've been in this situation before in my career, where you've been out for a while and, due to circumstances, you have to go back in pretty quickly.

"But at times like this, you have to have a belief in your own ability, which I have.

"I had planned all last week for the Rotherham game to be on, I'd trained well and was looking forward to playing again.

"Unfortunately, it wasn't to be.

"But I've been doing extra fitness and sharpness work in training.

"And it's a case of knuckling down this week and preparing for Shrewsbury."

Gulls manager Martin Ling has firm faith in his summer signing.

"At the start of this good run we've been on Brian was in the team alongside Mark Ellis, he was playing his best football since he came here and Chris Robertson was on the bench and couldn't get in the team," he said.

"Brian started playing regularly at Orient when I was manager there, and I've now signed him twice since then – you don't do that unless you believe in someone.

"He's a player I've always trusted. Could he be better prepared in terms of match pitch-time? Yes. But will he be able to cope? Yes, again."

Londoner Saah certainly doesn't lack experience.

He'd played more than a hundred games for Orient before his 23rd birthday, and he's now taken that tally beyond the 200-mark for Cambridge and Torquay.