When we look at the big picture than he could might as well be dropped, i see Max is considering Cuadrado for RB/RWB more often lately so this could indicate that Howedes's UCL spot might be sacrificed for someone whos fit(could very well be Pjaca if all goes well for him next couple of weeks) as we already have MDS/Cuads and even Barzagli that could fill in at right-back if necessary.
That's the case most of the time. General rule of thumb is if a player is out for x period of time, it takes x period of time for him to get back to 100% after he starts training.
Look how long it's taking Marchisio. Remember how long it took Asamoah? He had the usual muscular issues after going from sedentary for a year to high intensity games. People started panicking and wanted to sell him super cheap or rescind his contract thinking his career was over lol.
Pjaca was playing with primavera not too long ago. Makes no sense to already complain about his playing time. Esp with even Berna hardly getting any with so much depth up front.
You will when 2 of our CBs are injured at the same time (which for us is a matter of when, not if) or when MDS misses more than a couple of games again.
And MDS has been decent/good post-Napoli match, but Howedes is better. When fit, the latter should start in CL knockouts.