Leeds United: No long-term concerns over Chris Wood

The New Zealand international has missed five of United’s last seven games after initially pulling his hamstring during December’s 2-2 draw at home to Derby.

The six-foot-three forward then returned as a second half substitute for January’s 1-0 win at home to Bristol City but then limped off after 19 minutes of the following 1-1 draw at Brentford and subsequently missed last weekend’s 2-1 victory at Bolton in the FA Cup.

Evans has since confirmed that Wood will now miss another fortnight - with a fresh hamstring injury - but the Whites head coach is confident Wood’s problems will only be short term.

“Big Chris will be a couple of weeks we think,” said Evans, speaking at Thursday afternoon’s Thorp Arch press conference ahead of Saturday’s Championship hosting of Nottingham Forest.

“He’s got a little strain in a different muscle on the hamstring.

“The one that he was out for four weeks with is perfect, that was the way the consultant described it, but the other little muscle that is in there had a couple of little strains and that can come from a multitude of reasons or you can just be unfortunate.

“Chris had a similar instance back in his Leicester days on the opposite leg where he did a hamstring.

“He was out for a while, and came back and got a little niggle on the other one but touch wood since then he has had no problem with that.

“We have just got to make sure we give him this couple of weeks and we’ll see if we can get him fit ready and fit for the cup tie.”

Evans also confirmed that both Liam Cooper and Sol Bamba were both fully fit for Saturday’s visit of Forest while Alex Mowatt has also returned to training.

Cooper missed the win at Bolton with a hip injury while Bamba limped off with cramp at the Macron.

Mowatt, meanwhile, had been having problems with a groin injury.

Recent signing Toumani Diagouraga is a slight doubt with a cold.

“Liam trained fully on Tuesday and he trained very well this morning,” said Evans.

“Sol was back in the group for the first time today and was excellent so we’ve got good competition in that area.

“Alex has trained all week and he has been particularly impressive if I’m being honest.

“We just want to make sure he gets a full week’s training behind him and then we can get him back involved.

“The one thing Alex Mowatt has is quality, when he can score 12 goals from midfield in the Championship last year.”