The wait continues for Artturi Lehkonen

BROSSARD - Artturi Lehkonen has been sidelined for the last month with a lower-body injury and there is still no official timetable for his return.

Following Wednesday morning's practice at the Bell Sports Complex, the 22-year-old Finnish left-winger confirmed that the next step in his recovery is to re-join his teammates at practice, but he isn't exactly sure when that will be.
"It was sort of like a nagging thing. It kept bugging me," said Lehkonen, on the injury that has kept him out of the lineup since November 14, forcing him to miss the last 13 games. "It wasn't getting better, so we decided [that it was better for me] to take time off."

Lehkonen resumed skating solo last week on the South Shore and has been hitting the ice every day since. But, there's clearly plenty of work left to be done before he returns to active duty.
Watching his teammates from afar over the last four weeks has been especially tough.
"Of course you miss the guys and you want to get involved with them and you want to help out the team and really give everything you've got for the team," said Lehkonen, who had amassed two goals and five points in 18 games before both he and the Canadiens' medical staff agreed that it would be best to shut him down. "It sucks being injured."
While the Canadiens' will be deprived of Lehkonen's services when they play host to the New Jersey Devils on Thursday night at the Bell Centre, defenseman Shea Weber is good to go after being given a therapy day on Tuesday.
Weber returned to practice on Wednesday alongside the rest of Claude Julien's troops, and it was back to business as usual for the veteran rearguard.
"I didn't plan on missing it," cracked Weber, when asked if he'd be patrolling the blue line against the Devils. "I'm just trying to use some of the extra days we have here and use it to rest and be ready to go."

Admittedly, though, Weber hasn't fully recovered from a lower-body injury that affected him in the latter stages of November causing him to miss six straight games.
"Nobody plays at 100 percent. Everyone deals with different sorts of pain and grinds away. You've just got to get your job done," said Weber, who returned to the lineup on December 2 against Detroit. "I'm dealing with it day to day. Obviously, you want it to get better, but it's tough when you're skating every day. I'm just trying to move forward."