Aston Villa manager Steven Gerrard provides fresh injury update ahead of Crystal Palace game

Villa are close to welcoming a number of players back to fitness
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Aston Villa manager Steven Gerrard has provided an update on a number of the claret & blue’s current injured crop ahead of Saturday’s trip to Crystal Palace.

Morgan Sanson, Douglas Luiz & Bertrand Traore have all missed a large chunk of recent matches whereas Trezeguet remains a long term absentee.

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Sanson was a shock inclusion on the bench in last weekend’s victory over Brighton but Gerrard explained his addition was more of a morale booster than anything else and the Frenchman still isn’t ready for a full 90 minutes.

“I think the decision on Morgan last week was more for him,” explained the boss.

“I think he’d had a tough time, a frustrating time. So I wanted to put him in to make him feel good, I wanted him to feel part of it.

“And also it was a right fresh start and he’d put in two real strong training performances. He’s backed that up this week and he’s built on that.

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“He’s starting to look a little bit fitter and sharper as the days go by but he needs more work, he needs more training sessions before he’s fully ready.”

It’s clear to see the new manager is taking a ‘better to be safe than sorry’ approach to those currently unavailable which isn’t a bad thing whatsoever if you take into account their recent injury records.

But it is good news on the whole for Gerrard who could potentially be just weeks away from having a fully fit squad to choose from with Trezeguet, Luiz and Traore all either now available or close.

“Trezeguet is training well after a long injury,” he added.

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“We’re hoping to get another week into Trez and then hopefully look for some game time from an under 23s point of view to try and build some game time into his legs.

“Douglas Luiz will come back into the squad this weekend, he’s trained well. I’ll decide late whether he’s going to go in from the start or come into the game.”

Traore, who has been unavailable since picking up an injury on international duty with Burkina Faso looks to be the furthest away.

Gerrard added that he’s “progressing well” but is still quite a few weeks away from even joining in with team training.

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