Brentford defender Henry suffers suspected ACL injury
theathletic.com
Rico Henry has suffered a suspected anterior cruciate ligament injury. Henry went down awkwardly in the 39th minute of Brentford’s 1-0 defeat to Newcastle United on Saturday following a collision with Kieran Trippier. Henry was clutching his left knee in pain and the referee Craig Pawson signalled for a stretcher. However, the 26-year-old was able to get up and walk off the pitch into the dressing room aided by two members of Brentford’s medical staff. Thomas Frank said after the game Henry would be assessed on Monday and scans have revealed the extent of the damage. The average recovery...

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Obviously it looked pretty bad when Henry came off on Saturday, and although nothing is confirmed yet this his highly discouraging.

Outside of Henry and Aaron Hickey, this Brentford team has no natural left backs and fairly minimal depth at right back, with Roerslev and Ajer the obvious choices. Both are defensively oriented players, although they’ve had occasional moments in attack (Ajer’s gallop forward against Fulham this year comes readily to mind). This team has also made a wide range of unothodox choices at that position when chasing games, with Janelt, Mbeumo, Mee, Ghoddos, Wissa, and last week, Pinnock all occupying those spaces in the last two seasons.

Henry’s statistical profile is an odd one, mostly because he barely ever touches the ball and thus doesn’t rack up elite totals of just about anything. When he does get involved, though, his involvements tend to be relatively impactful, and he certainly looks good making overlapping runs, delivering crosses, and slowing down opposing attackers in 1v1 situations. Henry’s near-constant presence on the field is also notable: he missed exactly one game last season (matchweek 20 against Bournemouth, with Janelt and Ajer the starting fullbacks in a 4-3-3) and was substituted in just eight league games, only once before the 71st minute and only thrice more before the 86th. That mix of attack, defense, and stamina will not be easily replaced by any one player on this Brentford squad.

Jay Harris speculates in the article that Brentford might shift into a back three full time to offer additional defensive cover and allow a more attack minded player to take a wingback spot. That’s a reasonable option, but compounds the existing problems with this roster: there are only four true attackers (Mbeumo, Wissa, Shade, and KLP), of whom Mbeumo is both the clear first choice up top and the most experienced wingback option. Two of the best fits to play a 10 role in a 3-5-2 (Dasilva and Baptiste) are also out with long term injuries. Perhaps Damsgaard can step up to fill one of those roles more reliably than he’s shown thus far?

I’ll be interested to see how Frank opts to fill the void here, but it’s very unfortunate that he’ll have to.