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Bristol City midfielders Max Bird and Josh Stokes are both currently sidelined(Image: EFL and Rogan\/ Bristol City)<\/p>\nBristol City boss Gerhard Struber has provided an update on Max Bird and Josh Stokes’ returns from their respective injuriesBristol City midfielders Max Bird and Josh Stokes are both currently sidelined(Image: EFL and Rogan\/ Bristol City)<\/p>\n
Max Bird and Josh Stokes’ recovery from their respective injuries looks “really good”, according to Gerhard Struber, with the Bristol City<\/a> boss providing the latest on the Robins duo as well as a timeline of when supporters could see them return to the fold.<\/p>\n The Reds have been operating for much of the season so far without several members of their first-team squad due to a variety of fitness-related issues<\/a>. While all of Jason Knight, Cam Pring, Neto Borges, and Mark Sykes returned from injury to feature against Swansea City last time out<\/a>, there are still a fair number of players on the road to recovery.<\/p>\n Bird and Stokes are amongst the current group of absentees. The former last featured for City against Sheffield Wednesday in September, before suffering a calf injury, whilst Stokes has been sidelined since late August after sustaining a broken metatarsal against Fulham<\/a> in the Carabao Cup.<\/p>\n READ MORE: Bristol City to make late Scott Twine call for Wrexham trip as new Robins injury update issued<\/a>READ MORE: Every word Gerhard Struber said on Swansea, Bristol City change, Radek ‘The Wall’ Vitek and more<\/a><\/p>\n In their fitness update published during the November international break<\/a>, the Robins suggested both players had – or in Bird’s case, were about to – restart on-pitch work as they continued their recovery.<\/p>\n Though at this stage, they’re still training away from the first-team squad, Struber is positive about the progress they have made in their bid to return to full fitness.<\/p>\n “Right now, we have really good feedback, especially today from Birdy,” the head coach told Bristol Live<\/a> in his pre-match press conference on Tuesday. “From the individual training sessions, it looks really good.<\/p>\n “So, he made the next step [and] everything looks good. We hope [for] the best that he’s back super soon. With Stokes, I would say it also looks really good.<\/p>\n Bristol City looking to build on last season’s play-off finish under Gerhard Struber and you won’t miss a beat with our free newsletter.<\/p>\n All the latest news, views, interviews, gossip and analysis concerning the Robins, delivered straight to your inbox.<\/p>\n It’s completely free and you can sign up HERE<\/a><\/p>\n “He should also be back, I would say, in the next 14 days on the grass with us. Then he starts in the training weeks, and then we look [at] how everything is going. But both players make a really good picture, right now.”<\/p>\n With the Robins’ numbers so restricted in recent months, several academy players have featured on Struber’s side’s bench in the Championship this term.<\/p>\n For City’s final game prior to the November international break, against Watford, all of Leo Pecover, Olly Thomas<\/a>, Elijah Morrison, Jed Meerholz, and Ephraim Yeboah were named amongst the substitutes, with Pecover and Thomas introduced late on at Vicarage Road.<\/p>\n With Knight, Sykes, Borges, and Pring all returning to the squad for Saturday lunchtime’s 3-0 win over Swansea, however, space on the Reds’ bench was limited. Pecover, Yeboah, and Meerholz all dropped out of the matchday side – as did Joe Lumley – with Thomas and Morrison the two youth prospects to remain<\/a>.<\/p>\n Join Bristol City Live’s Whatsapp community for all the biggest Bristol City stories sent straight to your phone<\/strong><\/p>\n Bristol City Live<\/a> is now on WhatsApp and we want you to join our community.<\/p>\n Through the app, we\u2019ll send the Bristol City news, live match coverage, team news, transfers, fixtures, analysis and more straight to your phone.<\/p>\n To join our community you need to already have WhatsApp. All you need to do is click this link and select \u2018Join Community\u2019.<\/a><\/p>\n No one will be able to see who is signed up and no one can send messages except the Bristol Live<\/a> team.<\/p>\n We also treat community members to special offers, promotions and adverts from us and our partners. If you don\u2019t like our community, you can check out at any time you like.<\/p>\n To leave our community, click on the name at the top of your screen and choose \u2018Exit group\u2019.<\/p>\n If you\u2019re curious, you can read our Privacy Notice.<\/a><\/p>\n Click here to join our WhatsApp community.<\/a><\/p>\n While the youngsters left out may not have been involved in the gameday itself at the weekend, they are very much included in the day-to-day first-team activities at the High Performance Centre.<\/p>\n “I would say, they are – most of the time – with us in the training sessions,” Struber explained. “They are in the meetings with us, so they know exactly what we want.<\/p>\n “Also, we have, in the end, in this setting much more control over them [than if] they were always between the Under-21s and us [where they’d have] different loads. I think, in this direction, it’s really good to see how they grow in our team.”<\/p>\n READ MORE: Gerhard Struber sets Jason Knight expectation after Bristol City ‘capitano’ makes injury return<\/a>READ MORE: ‘That’s why I came’ – Emil Riis clear on Bristol City play-off credentials after Swansea strike<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Bristol City boss Gerhard Struber has provided an update on Max Bird and Josh Stokes’ returns from their…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":593613,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8818],"tags":[381,2686,748,393,14590,4884,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-593612","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-bristol","8":"tag-bristol","9":"tag-bristol-city-fc","10":"tag-britain","11":"tag-england","12":"tag-football-league-championship","13":"tag-great-britain","14":"tag-uk","15":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115612484562204146","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/593612","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=593612"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/593612\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/593613"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=593612"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=593612"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=593612"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/1758015353_222_0_GettyImages-2232406771.jpg\")
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