Luca Scassa will complete the 2016 World Superbike championship for VFT Racing Ducati in place of the injured Fabio Menghi, who will miss the rest of the year recovering from surgery.

Menghi, who suffered a nasty crash at the start of the year at Phillip Island, was unable to return until the Misano round in June and despite entering the Laguna Seca race weekend with high hopes he was forced to pull out with a reoccurring problem.

As a result, the Italian has been forced to undergo further surgery to a bicep tendon and supraspinatus tendon which will cause him to miss the remainder of the season.

Scassa, who stepped in for Menghi at Sepang and Donington Park earlier in the year, will complete the 2016 campaign starting at the Lausitzring on the 16-18 September.

"I'm very happy that Menghi family and VFT team decided to call me in order to replace Fabio due to his injury," Scassa said. "It means that we've been working well together. I'm training and I hope to do well and resume the work we had started.

"These will be quite important races for me because I want to understand what to do in my future and how to set my upcoming projects. It will be a nice test for me and I will give 100% as always."

Elsewhere, Markus Reiterberger is optimistic he'll be fit for his home round in Germany with Althea BMW after being given the green light to race by his medical team.

The German fractured a vertebrae in a heavy crash at Misano in June and duly missed the final round in America before the extensive summer break but feels ready to return to action next weekend.