West Ham United manager David Moyes is hopeful of having striker Michail Antonio available for selection for Sunday’s Premier League London derby with Tottenham Hotspur.
The Hammers forward, who has five goals to his name this term, has missed his team’s last two fixtures after being withdrawn against Fulham suffering with fatigue.
Speaking in his pre-match press conference on Friday, Moyes revealed that Antonio has been back on the training pitch in recent days and showing good signs that he is nearing a return to action.
“Michail has a good chance of being available for Sunday because he’s had three days training,” the manager revealed.
“We’ve always been careful with Mich in trying to get him right, but he was close for the last game. We didn’t quite think it was worth the risk.
“He’s not been training with the group every day, but he’s been doing some individual work and hopefully we’ll know a bit more tomorrow.”
In Antonio’s absence, Jarrod Bowen featured in a central position in Monday night’s 3-0 victory over Sheffield United, linking up well with Jesse Lingard and Manuel Lanzini in attack.
Moyes said that performance was a marker of his team’s adaptability and he was impressed with his players’ ability to cover their missing focal point.
“Sometimes that’s part of your job as a coach,” he added. “You can’t just buy somebody in when you lose a player to injury. You have to find solutions within your squad.
“We’ve had to do it a couple of times since we’ve been here and I thought Jarrod played really well in the game in midweek.
“It’s not as if it’s strange for Jarrod, because he’s played as a centre-forward for Hull City many times as well.
“That’s part of having a good squad and you need the squad to be flexible nowadays. Having people who can play in two or three different positions is always good – hopefully we don’t need to use them [in that way] too much, but when you do have a few injuries you have to.”
