West Ham boss David Moyes has provided a fresh injury update on his squad ahead of the Hammers’ Europa League semi-final first-leg clash with Eintracht Frankfurt on Thursday.
The Irons are due to play their biggest match in decades when they host the German side at the London Stadium, with Moyes speaking to the press from the club’s Rush Green training ground on Wednesday to preview the match. There, the Scotsman gave an injury update on his squad, including the fitness of centre-back Kurt Zouma.
The 27-year-old summer signing has been on the treatment table since early April after sustaining a knock during West Ham’s 2-0 defeat at Brentford. Since then, with both Issa Diop and Angelo Ogbonna out for the season, Craig Dawson has been holding down the fort with makeshift partners Aaron Cresswell and Ben Johnson.
READ MORE: West Ham press conference recap: David Moyes on Eintracht Frankfurt, Kurt Zouma and more
Speaking to the media on Thursday, Moyes said: "Angelo Ogbonna's back. He only came back this week. When I say 'back', I mean back in the building, so I would be amazed if he played before the end of the season. Kurt Zouma's back doing some light work - he's ahead of schedule, which is really good - and Issa Diop is actually doing quite well as well. He just feels a little better than we first hoped, so there's a bit of positivity around those players, and because of that, it's given us a bit of positivity that it won't be quite as long as we thought it would be."
But despite the positive update from the West Ham boss, he added that he would not be prepared to rush any of his players back in order for them to feature in the first leg on Thursday night. He said: "I never rush players back. It's always better to make sure they're right, so we would only put players out if we thought they were trained and we thought fit and ready to play."
Tomorrow's match against Frankfurt will arguably be the biggest of Moyes' managerial career, with this being his first European semi-final tie after returning to the Hammers as their manager in 2019 following an initial one-year stint in charge from 2017 to 2018. Prior to that, the Scotsman had spells managing Preston North End, Everton, Manchester United, Real Sociedad and Sunderland to varying success but admitted he always thought he'd be able to get West Ham challenging for top honours upon his return.
"I honestly thought if I could get it going, I'd have a team challenging," he said. "Is it by luck, by plan or design? Sometimes you need a bit of all of them. To bring West Ham from where they've been to where we are today is huge. To get to the semi-final of a European competition and give ourselves a real chance of getting to a final is something really special."
