Given the utter state of despair surrounding West Ham these days, they could really have used the boost that the return of arguably their best player – Dean Ashton – would have provided to their fight for Premiership survival.
But as with every Hammer dream this season, it’s been promptly crapped on from a very high height,
Ashton told The Sun: ‘I’m not even thinking about match-fitness.
‘I’m just trying to build myself up slowly.
‘People see it as just a broken bone. It’s more complicated than that.
‘I had a cortisone injection to get rid of some scar tissue about five weeks ago and after that everything was feeling really good.
‘My ankle was actually feeling the best it has felt. So I started doing fitness work again. I was feeling great.
‘But because I came out on to the training pitches looking really good and being really optimistic, perhaps people got the wrong end of the stick.’
At first West Ham’s plight was admittedly a bit enjoyable after all the gloating we their fans shelled out post-Tevezcherano and then again post-takeover. But since then, virtually everything that could have gone wrong, has, and it’s quite depressing.