Roy Hodgson has confirmed that several members of Crystal Palace's first-team have returned from relatively long periods of injury ahead of the Eagles' clash with Sheffield United.

The Palace manager revealed that Patrick van Aanholt, Andros Townsend and Christian Benteke have all recovered in time for the game - and provided a positive update on the team in general.

He said: "Andros is back, he’s recovered from his injury as has Joel Ward and Patrick van Aanholt, as has Christian Benteke and Luka is no longer suspended. It’s very different to what we’ve had in the last few weeks.

"It’s better, the injury situation has improved enormously."

Hodgson also revealed that Cenk Tosun will be unavailable for the meeting with the Blades, but remarked that the upcoming game with Everton makes the Turkey international's hamstring injury relatively well-timed. Going on to update about those few members of the squad still sidelined, Hodgson said: "Mamadou Sakho is still missing alongside Jeffrey Schlupp because it’s a long term injury [for both].

"They’re both quite serious injuries and when it happened I was told to not count on them being back for months rather than weeks.

"We’ve had to add Cenk Tosun to that list because he got a hamstring injury in the last game against Southampton. He’s been having treatment all week. The good news is he can’t play against Everton anyway so he’s got plenty of time to recover for our next game after that one.

"After the situation we’ve had it’s nice to be going into this game [v United] with so many players recovered."

There are a handful of tickets remaining for the Sheffield United clash - you can buy yours by clicking here, by calling 0871 200 0071 or by visiting the Box Office at Selhurst Park in person.