West Ham are sweating on the fitness of Michail Antonio ahead of Thursday’s Europa Conference League semi-final second leg at AZ Alkmaar.
Antonio’s strike secured a 2-1 win for the Hammers in the first leg at the London Stadium but the forward missed Sunday’s 2-0 Premier League defeat at Brentford with a calf problem.
Boss David Moyes made nine changes against the Bees, West Ham’s 53rd match of the season, with the hectic schedule beginning to catch up with his players.
With Gianluca Scamacca injured and Danny Ings struggling for goals, Antonio would be a huge miss as the Hammers bid to reach a first European final in 47 years.
Moyes said: “I’ve no idea yet how he is going to be for Thursday.
“I could put them out and then continue to get more injuries, because we’ve had a relentless season of games which has been really really difficult to cope with.
“I made nine changes because of the fatigue and because we had beaten Manchester United and we had beaten Alkmaar.
“If I’m being honest, if I’m going to keep flogging the same players all the time then I’m going to break them and that’s wrong.
“We had an injury to Michail because he’s been putting in the miles in the games and I just don’t want it to be anybody else. That was the risk.
“We’ll now go into the semi-final, I’ll dust myself down, get myself back on it and we’ll go in there hoping to reach the final.”
Goals from Bryan Mbeumo and Yoane Wissa gave Thomas Frank his 100th win as Brentford boss.
It was all the more impressive given the Bees were without 20-goal frontman Ivan Toney.
Frank said: “It’s a hamstring injury. We’ll assess him during the week and, hopefully, he’s going to be available for Tottenham next weekend. That’s what we’re working towards.
“I would obviously like Ivan in the team, but you need other players that can step in and Wissa, again, stepped in and scored. Fantastic.”
