Patson Daka is out on the grass at Leicester City’s Seagrave base but is “nowhere near” to rejoining training with his team-mates.
Daka underwent ankle surgery in the summer after sustaining an injury in City’s final pre-season friendly against Lens. After a couple of months of rehab, he was pictured on the grass at Seagrave last week in a big step towards his return.
But manager Steve Cooper is not thinking about the Zambian returning to the fold any time soon. There’s still a way to go before he will be in contention.
“I’m not sure on the timeline,” Cooper said. “He’s definitely back on the grass but he’s nowhere near training with the team yet. He’s continuing his rehab well and the medical team are really happy with his progression. And he’s got a brilliant attitude to everything he does. He will be back as soon as his body and his injury allows him to.”
Daka is one of three players out injured for City at the moment. Jakub Stolarczyk is also back on the grass at the training ground as he recovers from a broken foot suffered early in pre-season. He’s due to be out for another four-to-six weeks.
With 13 players away on international duty, Cooper is left with a training squad of 12 outfield players for the next week and a half. They are Conor Coady, James Justin, Ricardo Pereira, Luke Thomas, Harry Winks, Oliver Skipp, Boubakary Soumare, Michael Golding, Will Alves, Stephy Mavididi, Jamie Vardy and Odsonne Edouard.
Cooper added: “The work continues during the international break. I will be completely obsessed with Southampton. It will be a less intense week this week obviously as there’s no preparing for a Premier League game and playing a Premier League game, but there’s still work to be done. There’s a lot of lads going but there’s a lot of lads staying as well and we’ll build a programme around them and just do everything to kick on when we get back.”
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