Manchester United injury news: Luke Shaw returns to Carrington with club hopeful he could return this season

Shaw has not played since suffering a double leg fracture in the Champions League defeat by PSV Eindhoven last September

Luke Shaw has returned to Carrington to step up his recovery from a broken leg (Getty Images)

Injured Manchester United defender Luke Shaw gave his team-mates a welcome boost on transfer deadline day as he returned to the club’s Carrington training base to step up his recovery from a broken leg that he suffered earlier in the season, prompting hope that he could yet play again this season.

Shaw has been keen to stress that he is taking his recovery one step at a time after he suffered a double leg fracture in a challenge by PSV Eindhoven’s Hector Moreno during United’s 2-1 defeat back in September.

It was expected that Shaw would be ruled out until the end of April at the earliest, and all expectations were that he would not play again this season given the lengthy rehabilitation required to heal such a serious injury and get back to the fitness levels expected of a Premier League footballer.

But the sight of Shaw arriving at Carrington on Monday alongside his United and England team-mate Ashley Young signals the next step in the 20-year-old’s recovery, and the club are carefully hoping that the left-back could return ahead of May if all goes according to plan.

Shaw’s form in 2015 saw him assert himself as Roy Hodgson’s first-choice left-back, only for the injury to put his place in the squad for Euro 2016 in serious doubt.

The defender required two separate operations in the Netherlands before flying back to Manchester, where he began his rehabilitation away from the club.