West Ham United striker Andy Carroll denies rumours of injury setback

West Ham United striker Andy Carroll has rejected rumours that he has suffered a setback in his recovery from a knee injury.

The 27-year-old has been out of action since picking up the problem during the first leg of the Hammers' Europa League tie against Astra Giurgiu in August.

Recently, rumours emerged that the former Liverpool forward, who was expected to be out of action for between four and six weeks, had been dealt a fresh blow, but the player has denied the claims.

Carroll tweeted: "My recovery is going great this was a 6-8 week injury so everything is going to plan!! #NoSetback."

The club's head of medical and sports science Stijn Vandenbroucke has commented on the status of Carroll's fitness, telling West Ham's official website: "Andy Carroll is progressing well in his recovery from the knee injury he suffered at Astra Giurgiu in August and will start training with Eamon during the final stages of his rehab ahead of joining first-team training.

"Sometimes it is difficult with certain injuries to put an exact timeframe on how long a player will be unavailable for, and in those cases we try not to raise expectation by mentioning a date by which we expect a player to return.

"In this age of 24-hour news coverage, the internet and social media, there is obviously a high demand for this kind of clarification but, on occasion, it is not possible to satisfy this demand because the return dates are too difficult to predict."

Meanwhile, Winston Reid has recovered from a knock, while Aaron Cresswell is "progressing well" from a knee injury.