Colchester United winger Brennan Dickenson continues to make good progress from his injury sustained earlier this year.
The powerful wide man has been in the treatment room for several months now, but physio Tony Flynn is pleased with how he is recuperating from his ruptured Anterior Cruciate Ligament.
Tony explained in his programme notes on Saturday: "The recognised recovery period for this specific injury is nine months, as a realistic minimum, and it isn't often that players are back much before that.
"Brennan is now outside on the training ground most days, getting plenty of running and fitness work done. We will step that up to twisting, turning and sprinting when we feel he is ready for that and he has already started some tenative and basic ball work.
"All these aspects will increase in intensity as time goes by and, when he is perfectly happy with it all in an individual sense, we can slowly introduce him to the group training.
"He won't join in with any contact sessions at first, but that will come in time."
Injuries can test a player's mentality as they prepare for a spell on the sidelines, but Tony was full of praise with how Brennan has contended with his long term absence.
"Brennan has been excellent and, although I am sure he was devastated about being injured, he quickly got in the mindset that he would be back and just had to do the work required to make sure he was as close as possible to the nine month schedule," he added.
"He has not had to be pushed or prodded to get the work done, he has been a model professional for us in the medical department."