WEYMOUTH boss David Oldfield has confirmed a lack of match minutes was behind the decision to let Jordan Greenidge join Dartford on loan.

Greenidge has failed to score or assist a goal in Weymouth colours since his move from Newport County.

His blank run stretches 322 minutes across six appearances, meaning he has often played second fiddle to either Dan Smith, Brandon Goodship or Mannie Mampala.

Explaining his decision to loan the striker out to National League South side Dartford, Oldfield told Echosport: “We have a lot of players in our group – many of them need football.

READ MORE: Altrincham 5-0 Weymouth - match reaction

“Jordan needs football matches and so do many others at our place. It’s an opportunity for Jordan to go and get some minutes and matches under his belt.

“Hopefully he’ll do very well at a club that has ambition there. It’s a case of going out to get minutes and we’ll see what happens next.”

Oldfield, speaking after the 5-0 loss to Altrincham, also shed light on the illness that has infiltrated Weymouth’s camp.

“We had three or four of the boys back,” he revealed. “Tom Blair, Tom Bearwish, Brandon Goodship among others.

“Ross Fitzsimons as well has been ill, but Ross for example needs to play. Tommy Scott, the other goalkeeper, was also ill in that period of time.

“I think it’s really important that we don’t look for any excuses. Everybody gets illness, we’re just trying to deal with that situation the best we can and move forward.”

Oldfield also revealed Sean Shields trained on Monday but had not sufficiently recovered from the illness to travel to Altrincham.