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First Team

Team news: Brooks, King & Wilshere latest

David Brooks and Joshua King are fit to be involved, as the pre-Brentford team news was discussed by Jason Tindall.

Brooks played 69 minutes on a energy-sapping pitch at Luton Town before Christmas, while King last appeared in the mid-December win over Wycombe.

Ahead of the midweek trip to the Brentford Community Stadium, the manager assessed his squad in his pre-match press conferece.

"David Brooks is fine and trained extremely well in the last seven to ten days, looking very good," said Tindall.

"Josh King is in a really good place, we're really pleased with the way Josh has trained in the last three or four days.

"I think he's over the back injury that he had and that was due probably to working almost too hard too soon on the training ground after he had Covid.

"He's trained well in the last couple of days, looked really sharp and he'll certainly be in the squad for tomorrow."

After missing seven games Tindall said that Arnaut Danjuma is closing in on a return, with defender Chris Mepham not far behind him.

"Danjuma is very very close now," said Tindall. "It was one which took a lot longer than we hoped and initially planned for. He's on the right track, doing extremely well and we should have him back available very soon.

"Meps is just starting to go outside on the training pitches with the physio and in the next week his programme will intensify and then we'll start to push him a little bit harder, hoping to have him back within the next two to three weeks.

It emerged on Tuesday that former Cherries loanee Jack Wilshere has joined the squad to train this week, the manager explaining the situation further.

"Jack's a player I've stayed in touch with ever since his time at Bournemouth. He was a great lad, a joy to work with and he did extremely well for us," he said.

"Jack got in touch with me, we spoke on the phone and he asked if he could come in and train with the team. I had no problem and no issues with that, I know what a good lad he is and the quality's he's got.

"He's trained with us for two days and it's a matter of seeing how things go. The only discussion we've had is about training with the team, we've had no more discussions about what might happen beyond this point.

"From my point of view as manager while he's here I'm looking at him to see how he's doing and if he fits in well in well with the group and there's a conversation to be had later on down the line then maybe we will do.

"It's certainly not at the forefront of anyone's thinking at the minute."

Midfielder Jefferson Lerma is facing an FA charge for an incident at Sheffield Wednesday in November, his manager outlining the latest news on the situation.

"There's no news," he said. "We've appealed the charge against Jeff, we've denied it. We're co-operating with the necessary people and are waiting see what the next steps are."