Martin Laursen is set to hand Aston Villa a timely boost by returning from injury ahead of schedule.
The club captain, who has been forced to sit out the last three matches, is back in training after suffering a knee complaint.
The Denmark international has been plagued by similar problems in the past, with his career blighted by long spells on the sidelines.
However, he appears to have shaken off his latest setback and is expected to be back in contention for a first-team recall by the time the Villa head to Sunderland a week on Saturday.
Martin O'Neill will be hoping his skipper can come through the next few days unscathed while he has also welcomed the news that Carlos Cuellar, who is currently out with a hamstring complaint, is making good progress in his rehabilitation.
"I don't know whether Saturday (against West Brom) is too early for them, but they are certainly making progress in that direction," O'Neill told the Birmingham Mail.
"I'm hopeful that if there is no reaction to a little bit of running that they did on Monday that they could maybe do a little bit towards the end of the week.
"Maybe then there would be a possibility of them joining in with the group tomorrow or Friday.
"That might not be a possibility but, if not, then Sunderland would become a strong possibility if they could put themselves in contention.
"It is obviously very encouraging. The expected time frame for Cuellar with a tweaked hamstring was proved right.
"As for Martin, we are now very hopeful but more importantly Martin is hopeful."
O'Neill is reluctant to put a timescale on John Carew's recovery from a niggling back injury, but does expect to the Norwegian to be back in action sooner than initially expected.
"John Carew is making progress, obviously it is a bit more slowly," he said.
"We don't think it will be anything like the number of weeks that we were talking about before, so that is encouraging."
It had been feared that Carew would be unavailable until March, but with that no longer the case the towering frontman is expected to be spearheading Villa's European push once again in the not too distant future.
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