SOUTHEND United boss Phil Brown has slammed Stevenage for their treatment of Lee Barnard after it was confirmed the striker will be out for the next six weeks with an ankle injury.

Barnard has been on loan at Broadhall Way for the past two months and was injured early on during Stevenage’s 1-0 win against Exeter City just before Christmas.

Brown was originally told that Barnard’s injury was just a short-term one, only for his own medical staff to over-rule the diagnosis from Stevenage’s experts.

“To tell you to the truth we’re very disappointed with the situation all round,” said Brown.

“Barney didn’t have a scan, he didn’t get to see a doctor and was just treated by the physio there.

“When I spoke to their manager, Graham Westley, about it he was hopeful Barney would be fit for their game on Boxing Day.

“But Barney sent a picture of the injury to our physio who said there was just no way he would be fit in such a short space of time, unless he had an injection.

“We didn’t want that so we’ve called him back and it turns out he’s going to be out for a minimum of six weeks which is very frustrating for both him and ourselves.”

Barnard scored three goals in his first three games with Stevenage before going five matches without hitting the back of the net.

However, the loan spell still enabled the striker to get his sharpness back, until the injury setback.

And it now remains unclear what the future holds for the former Mayflower School pupil.

“At the moment we’re treating the injury as aggressively as we can to get him back fit as quickly as we can,” said Brown.

“We’re not really thinking beyond that at this stage but either he will be part of our plans or he will go out on loan again.

“We’re not sure at this stage but we’re just disappointed with how he’s been treated and it’s worlds away from how we looked after Jakub Sokolik when he got injured during his loan spell with us.”