da betano casino： Insider ExWHUEmployee has revealed that West Ham United defender Kurt Zouma could be back in time before the Europa Conference League final amid fears of a broken ankle.
What's the latest West Ham injury news?
da leao： The French centre-back picked up a worrying injury in the Hammers' recent 4-3 loss in the Premier League away at Crystal Palace, leading to fears that he could be out for the season.
In the immediate aftermath, manager David Moyes outlined his fears, telling the Evening Standard: “It looks as if he’s gone over on his ankle. His ankle’s swollen up at the moment, we’ll get him checked up tomorrow with a scan.”
While Ex then reported that "there are growing fears that this could be a season-ender." However, subsequent scans have shown that it's not quite as bad as first feared.
Indeed, now giving a new update on The West Ham Way podcast, the club insider revealed that some even feel as though Zouma could be back to play against Leeds United – which is the Iron's second last league game of the season.
He said (0:42): “The first fear was that he could have potentially broken his ankle. But thankfully, as the swelling started to go down a little bit, and they started to assess it a bit more, they realised it was strained ligament damage.
"Now, the hope is with him, he's a fast healer – in the sense that he recovers much quicker than other players – that there's still an outside hope that he might be able to come back within the next few weeks.
“Now, obviously, the last official game if we get to the final is June the sixth I think, or June the seventh for the conference final. So you'd like to think, if we got to that, he'd be available.
"There is even talk they could be back for the game after Brentford. So what would that be? Leeds at home, I think.
"But there is a chance obviously he could miss the rest of the season. So there's still not a definitive answer on it. But it looks better today than it did initially after the injury."
When is the Europa Conference League final?
Having been trusted to play in 28 league games this term, Moyes will no doubt be desperate to have Zouma back for the final two league games of the campaign – with relegation still a possibility.
However, there may be an added incentive to get the £125k-p/w defender back as soon as possible as West Ham could be playing in a European final on July 7.
Indeed, if Moyes' men can win their Europa Conference League semi-final against AZ Alkmaar in the coming weeks, then they'll have a shot at winning major silverware to complete their season.
And so, it's certainly good news that Zouma is still in with a shot a returning before the potential final – especially when it had initially looked as though his season was done.