Friday 9 October 2009

Injury Update 08/10/09


A day behind schedule, but I'll also post today's injury news later this afternoon....

It's every Liverpool fan's worst nightmare - talismanic striker Fernando Torres limped out of a training session with Spain on Wednesday night.

But the good news is that although Torres pulled up with a groin problem, he was later able to exercise on his own in the gym. He is expected to be fit for Spain's qualifying double header so should - fingers crossed - be fine for the Reds' vital week of games against Sunderland, Lyon and Manchester United.

Also missing international training on Wednesday was Aston Villa's Richard Dunne, though Ireland are playing down the seriousness of the defender's ankle knock ahead of their game with Italy.

There's also some good news for Fulham coming out of the Ireland camp as Damien Duff is having a scan on his calf injury on Thursday or Friday and could play against Montenegro next Wednesday and be ready for the Cottagers' next Premier League game.

Over to Manchester City, and Argentina boss Diego Maradona has been raging that Pablo Zabaleta played against Aston Villa on Monday night and picked up a hamstring injury that keeps him out of their vital qualifiers.

"Someone should have travelled to England to bring them back. Argentina have two massive games and Manchester City have 100 more," said Maradona.

"Once again these things have got away from us. It upsets me a lot that we can't rely on Zabaleta playing."

City have got enough problems of their own without worring about Argentina but at least Kolo Toure has said that he will be fit to face Wigan next week.

"I am having some pains but it will be fine for me after the international break," Toure told skysports.com. "I was desperate to play for my country against Malawi because we can qualify that day there, but I could not do it.

"I would like to let City fans know we are together and I should be fine. It was a very hard kick on my Achilles, but nothing is broken there."

Nigel de Jong (ankle) and Joleon Lescott (calf) also pulled out of international duty this week but are expected to recover in time to face the Latics.

City are currently 'topping' the injury charts, with Arsenal a close second, though Arsene Wenger is hoping to clear some people out of the treatment room this week.

"The timing of this international break is bad but hopefully our players will come back without injuries," he told the Gunners' official website.

"I hope as well that we can get some players back like Samir Nasri, like Manuel Almunia, like Lukasz Fabianski, during this break."

Everton are another team with problems, but they have announced that it is '99 per cent certain' that Phil Neville will not need an operation to cure his knee injury.

The Toffees' captain has been out of action since damaging knee ligaments in the defeat to Fulham in September.

"The surgeon has seen Phil twice now," Rathbone told Everton's official website on Wednesday.

"He was 90 per cent certain he didn't need surgery on the first visit and now he is 99 per cent certain Phil doesn't need an operation.

"You can never say never but, the way Phil is going in his rehabilitation, we're happy he is going to do well.

"He's been on the bike today and the cross-skier and he is telling me he is running tomorrow which was a bit of a shock to me because that is not in the schedule. But he is doing well and we are really happy with him."

Meanwhile, Steven Pienaar and Joseph Yobo are both expected to return from injury against Wolves.

Pienaar (knee) and Yobo (thigh) have both been sidelined recently, but Everton expect them to be available for the arrival of Mick McCarthy's side on 17th October.

"Steven got headbutted on the inside of the knee against Portsmouth and it was just unfortunate it caught him right on the medial ligament!" Rathbone said.

"He can use the exercise bike but it is pretty sore. I would, though, expect him to be there or thereabouts for the Wolves game."

Rathbone added on Yobo's status: "It was so, so minor. But if you do an injury like that the night before a game it doesn't give you a lot of time to recover.

"Joe has gone off with the Nigerian squad as they've got a very important game against Mozambique on Sunday and I think he will be fit for that."

Other injury snippets include Ledley King likely to return from a hamstring injury next week and Jose Bosingwa missing Portugal training with his hamstring problem.

Cheers,
AM

9 comments:

Jon said...

Hi AM - recently stumbled onto the blog, and want to say that you are doing a great job. Didn't make the blog leagues, so keeping an eye on the cup, just to see how far i get.

One thought - you have mentioned a couple of times how good you think the blog by the 2 Americans from YFF last year is. Any chance you could put a link up, for ease of access?

Anonymous said...

Neals and Jeremys blog: http://fantasyepl.blogspot.com

Ruki said...

I recommend that blog too. The 2 blogs of AM and Neals/Jeremy have been helping me a lot, make me enjoy this game much more( and watching soccer weekly).

Anonymous said...

No bias towards anyone......but NT / JS are way behind if i compare both the blogs.

Its time you look for sponsors.

Also I would like you to start same kind of chat session as Neel does every saturday only to disappear even before all the matches are over.

Hans

Simon said...

AM -
I have a suggestion
Why not write down the team ID's next to the team names and during the BC Week , you just have to type in the team id in the URL and see their weekly points.
Hope that makes it a bit easier for you

mudwalkerz said...

Hans, you are asking AM to miss out on his Spurs games? Not sure you'ld still like him as much.. frustrated as he might be in that case :D Let the man enjoy his portion of live football ;)

Mike B said...

In my opinion this blog is turning out to be superior to Jeremy and Neils. The information provided and the regularity of it is top notch! The comments left by others are just as much help and actually make an entertaining read =P

I do log on to J&N's for the matchday chat though, it's good to get updates on the games that aren't 10 minutes behind like Yahoo's "live commentary".

I'm actually gonna be donating a couple of quid to the cause when i get paid, it's well worth it for the time and effort put in. This blog adds so much more to the game.

Ruki said...

Hans, I already asked AM a while ago and he said he couldnt do it since he goes to Spur game most of the time. The chatbox we have could be used for such, in facts we have been using it during match day lately.

I like both blogs, and I dont want to compare whether which one is better. This one is more active as having more comments and AM posts more often on what he read about. Neal/Jeremy blog are less active, and while they do not post most of what they read about, they do leave the links for readers to browse on themself. Different style for each blog, and I really appreciate both parties' hardwork.

Bradley said...

Our cohort Steve Bob FC is featured by the Fanatacist over at the YFF blog. Congrats!

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