Ajax’s pursuit of their first Champions League points of the season has suffered another setback, with fresh injuries depleting their squad ahead of Wednesday’s trip to Qarabag.

The Dutch giants, four-time winners of Europe’s premier competition, have endured a miserable campaign so far — five games played, five defeats — leaving them anchored to the bottom of the expanded 36-team table. Their match in Azerbaijan had been earmarked as a chance to finally break the sequence.

But interim boss Fred Grim, installed after John Heitinga’s dismissal last month, confirmed that striker Wout Weghorst will miss the clash and be sidelined until next month. Centre-back Josip Šutalo and midfielder Kenneth Taylor have also remained in Amsterdam as they recover from knocks.

Weghorst picked up an ankle problem at the weekend, forcing Ajax to accelerate the reintegration of Kasper Dolberg. The Danish forward only recently returned from an abdominal wall injury but was already required to play an extended role during Saturday’s victory over Fortuna Sittard.

“He had to play longer than we would normally like, but sometimes you simply have no choice,” Grim admitted at Tuesday’s pre-match briefing.

With Ajax already on the brink of elimination — their hopes of scraping into the playoff places now remote — the temptation exists to preserve players for Sunday’s Eredivisie showdown with fierce rivals Feyenoord, who sit eight points clear of them in the league.

Grim, though, insists Ajax remain committed to winning in Europe: “We’re aiming for three points and to restore confidence. You always monitor the schedule and the physical demands on the squad, but we want to perform in every fixture. The players are pushing hard in training and eager to prove they deserve to start. We’ll see how the game progresses, but our ambition is to win.”

Šutalo and Taylor could return in time for the weekend. “They stayed back in Amsterdam. We now have to assess whether they can rejoin us before Sunday,” Grim said.

Despite their European struggles, Ajax have shown signs of recovery domestically, winning their last two league matches after a run of four straight defeats, including Champions League home losses to Galatasaray and Benfica.