Brentford FC Head of Medical Neil Greig updates fans on the current injury situation. There were seven players unavailable for the Sky Bet Championship match against Blackburn Rovers on Saturday, 7 November, and Marco Djuricin picked up an injury in that draw in Lancashire.

Neil said: “Josh McEachran has recovered well from his fractured foot and has been working hard to develop the physical conditioning aspect of his game, due to having missed our pre-season. His next progression is to play a part in a [behind closed doors] friendly game against AFC Bournemouth tomorrow [Friday] and then progressively increase his training and match exposure as he is able from that point.

“Jota is due to return to team training next week following his ankle surgery, having spent the past two weeks working on the field, partly with the team and partly with our conditioning staff. We are hoping that Jota will be able to take part in an arranged game during the week of the 23 November and will increase his game exposure as he is able from that point.

“Maxime Colin is also due to begin progressively building up his team training exposure during the next week, having completed a successful rehabilitation from his knee ligament injury. We hope that Maxime's first game exposure will be during the week commencing 30 November and that he will progress quickly from that point, given that he is generally a very well-conditioned player.

“Scott Hogan completed a successful reconditioning camp in Philadelphia last month and has returned to us in a positive position to progress. He has begun working outside with our medical and conditioning staff, where the aim is to progressively increase his capacity to change direction, accelerate and decelerate quickly. Understandably, we are not working to a time-scale driven recovery with Scott, as we still have some significant objective targets yet to achieve. However, we are very hopeful that the next phase of his rehabilitation will allow us to achieve and exceed those aims.

“Andreas Bjelland is now 12 weeks post-surgery on a significant injury to his left knee. Despite a slow start to his rehabilitation, due to his post-surgery restrictions, Andreas is now well on his way to achieving the agreed objective markers for the first phase of his recovery. He has been reviewed this week by the consultant knee surgeon, who was very pleased with the progress that he has made during this phase and we now have the green light to being to gradually increase his gym based load, working toward the objective markers required for returning to straight line running.

“Lewis Macleod has progressed well over the past two months and completed a series of Development Squad matches, including two 90 minutes games, without issue. He has begun to restore his match sharpness and impressed the coaching staff with his application and technical qualities. Unfortunately, during his most recent game against Reading [last Friday], Lewis sustained a small strain to the same hamstring, albeit a different area, which prevented him from completing the game as planned. Given the well documented issues that Lewis has experienced over the past ten months, every precaution was exercised and he was withdrawn from the game. We have thoroughly investigated Lewis's injury during the course of the week and sought the further advice of the consultant that has been assisting in the management of his case. The findings suggest that Lewis's injury, whilst relatively minor, will need to be progressively returned to training over the coming three to four weeks in order to account for his previous history. This news is disappointing for all involved, not least Lewis, and I'm sure that all of the supporters reading this will offer him their full support.

“Marco Djuricin sustained an injury to his left ankle, following a heavy tackle from an opposition defender, during our recent game against Blackburn. The injury, to his ankle ligaments, forced him to be withdrawn from the field and every precaution was taken to ensure that injury was stabilised and managed well during the journey back to London. In the past five days we have needed to carry out a thorough investigation of Marco's injury and seek the opinion of our consultant ankle surgeon, whilst communicating directly with Red Bull Salzburg regarding his care. Today we have learned that Marco is unlikely to require any surgical intervention to manage this injury, which should rehabilitate well conservatively. The timescales for returning to training from this kind of problem average at around eight weeks, although this can fluctuate either way between cases. With that in mind we now have a clear plan for the early part of his recovery and will update supporters as appropriate.”

All other First Team squad members are fit and in training. This includes Alan Judge, who has recovered from the hamstring injury that ruled him out of the last two matches and has linked up with the Republic of Ireland squad.