Port Vale’s players had their blood taken last week in order to measure their levels of fatigue.

John Harbin orgainsed a visit from Dr Jan Knight of Knight Scientific Ltd to perform the tests and give a talk to the Club’s medical department and coaching staff.

Harbin worked with Dr Knight during his time at Plymouth Argyle and is therefore familiar with her methods.

Staff from Crewe Alexandra, Stoke City and Staffordshire University also attended to learn about how readings from white blood cells can impact on stress and fatigue levels.

“Dr Knight performs a finger print blood test which gives you the white blood cell count,” Harbin told port-vale.co.uk.

“It basically tells us the stress levels of the players due to fatigue level. Based on the results we have some interventions we can use.

“It tells us whether the players are in need of supplements or a change of diet or whether they need to reduce workload in training.

“It also indicates whether certain players can do more. So it gives you that scientific guideline that helps you to analyse what we’re doing here.”

Dr Knight said the players were a pleasure to work with and explained how the results of the tests can be used to improve the health of the squad.

She added: “My impression of the players is that they were lovely. 

“The were good fun to work with and were all really, really interested in what we were doing so that was good.

“From the results it looks like John will really be able to help these people because our results show whether they are heading for infection or inflammation or fatigue.

“With these results John really can manage the players really well and he is really used to it so he understands what the tests can tell him.”