Not to the AFL, mind you, but back playing footy nonetheless.
The19-year-old will line up in the VFL this weekend after overcoming the knee and hamstring problems that have prevented him from adding to his total of five AFL games in 2007.
"The big positive is Scott Gumbleton will resume with Bendigo on Monday, which is fantastic for Scott and the Essendon Football Club, because he's put an enormous amount of work into his rehabilitation," coach Matthew Knights said.
"I'm going to enjoy driving out to Box Hill on Monday and seeing the big fella play.
"He's had a really fantastic month – he's signed with the club for two years, which from our point-of-view was a really proud moment, because he's really dedicating the next two or three years with this young group.
"I think he believes he's looking forward to playing with this young group that's coming through, as well as playing beside [Scott Lucas] and Lloydy (captain Matthew Lloyd) and learning the tricks of the trade.
"It's really positive. He's in a good frame of mind – he's really happy in himself.
"He's ready to play and we'll look at 60-70 minutes for him at Box Hill on Monday."
With Jobe Watson sitting out another week, Knights said the Bombers were unlikely to get anyone back from injury this weekend.
"No, I wouldn't have thought so. Jobe Watson missed last week, but Jobe will have another week. He needs to train a week-and-a-half fully – he's very keen, and put his hand up, but what happened last time is he came back and had to miss again, so we just want him to be completely right so he can play the whole year for us," he said.
"And we'll be a little bit conservative with Jay (Neagle) because of the history of the stress fractures he's had in the past.
"We're just mindful that we want him to be completely right when he plays AFL football, or you're not actually being fair on him, so he may miss this week also, with a look to bringing him back to [a] full training load the following week."
