Mark Hughes has confirmed that defender Glen Johnson has returned to full training, thus increasing the possibility of seeing him in the squad for the game against Tottenham this weekend.
The former Liverpool defender has been a major absentee for the club over the last seven months. He had just joined from Liverpool in the 2015 summer transfer window, but a serious injury in the game against Bournemouth back in February has seen a significant chunk of his Stoke City career spent on the sidelines. His presence has provided a lot of competition to Phil Bardsley and the rivalry is once again set to resume from this weekend.
Hughes is unlikely to go all out with Glen Johnson straightaway. He will be aware that after having spent a long time on the sidelines, Johnson will need at least a month before he can get the full fitness. The lack of a pre-season means that it will be at least a couple of months before Stoke City get to see the best of Johnson. Regarded as one of the best attacking right backs from England over the last decade, Johnson has played for the likes of Chelsea, Portsmouth, and Liverpool. His last spell with Liverpool was something of a renaissance, as he managed to make a majority of his 54 England appearances while playing for the Merseyside outfit.
“Glen joined in with the first team today, which is good, so we fully anticipate that he should be okay now. We’ll get some more training into him, certainly next week, we have league and cup games coming up so that’s a good opportunity to get him and other guys up to speed.Xherdan is still a little bit slow at the moment. We’ve tried something a little different with him this week just to push him on but he won’t be available for the weekend,” said Hughes.