MIDDLESBROUGH are no closer to having Darragh Lenihan, Marcus Forss or Riley McGree back in contention, with Michael Carrick unable to set a timescale on when he expects the key trio to be ready to return.

Lenihan hasn't featured for Boro since the win over Southampton at the end of September, Forss has been missing for the last three games and a plantar fasciitis issue has ruled McGree out of the last five fixtures, and it's not clear at this stage when they'll be back in action.

Boro are also without long-term absentees Tommy Smith and Lewis O'Brien but have no fresh injury concerns as they prepare for Saturday's visit of league leaders Leicester City.

“It’s pretty much the same at this stage. As time goes on and the weeks pass, hopefully some of the boys will get closer. But at this stage, we are what we are," said Carrick.

"None of them are massively close, to be honest. It's hard to give an exact timeframe. Riley has a problem with his foot and will still be a number of weeks. Everybody else is a little bit further than that."

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Even with a number of key first team players out injured, Carrick has had some difficult decisions to make of late, with those on the fringes such as Morgan Rogers and Sammy Silvera, catching the eye from the bench and in last week's Carabao Cup win over Exeter City.

Carrick said: "Some of the boys couldn't really do much more to get back in the team, and that's absolutely brilliant. It's on my toes to kind of manage that and try and pick the right team that gives us the right balance to win each game.

"But certainly, in training and in coming off the bench in games and making an impact, what they're giving me right now is all I can really ask of them. We've had this week to work more on the training pitches and this weekend it's a big game, of course it is.

"But we know it will be an incredibly busy period in terms of the amount of games we've got coming up and everyone is going to play their part and the boys are all ready for that. That's brilliant as far as I'm concerned. We want to be winning games, we want to be advancing in cup competitions and we want to be playing two or three games a week. I would never complain about that, I think it's a great time to be a footballer."