Crewe hoping on-loan Newcastle youngster will be back training after ankle injury.

On loan midfielder Liam Smith is hoping to make a successful return to full training next week. The Newcastle United youngster is on loan at Crewe until January and has recently to South Cheshire to continue his rehab after sustaining an ankle injury against Bolton back in pre-season.

September. ^thSmith had returned to his parent club to be assessed but he is now doing one-on-one work with Crewe’s head physio Rob Sharp. Smith will have another week of treatment and loading with Sharp before he will be considered for training ahead of our trip to Grimsby on 17

Steve Davis told the club’s official web-site: “Liam is fine and doing one-on-one work with Rob (Sharp). He will continue to do that for the rest of this week and we will then see if he is ready to return to full training with us the week after.

“His first step will be to get back and get some minutes with the Under-23s first because he has missed a number of weeks now.

“He suffered severe bruising around the ankle and it took a bit of time for that swelling to go down but he is running okay again and seems fine.”