? New muscle injury leaves little room to manoeuvre
? Manager wants to find space for Jonathan Woodgate
Harry Redknapp is agonising over whether to omit Ledley King from his 25-man senior squad amid fears that the Tottenham Hotspur captain will struggle to play again this season because of a serious groin injury.
King has not featured since he tore a muscle in the 2-1 Premier League win at Fulham on 16 October and, after a frustratingly slow rehabilitation, he aggravated the problem in training two weeks ago, ripping the adductor away from the bone. Surgery was considered but decided against as the operation would only have been to separate the muscle and the bone to give the body the basis to repair itself. Tottenham's medical team have devised strengthening work for the 30-year-old, who also suffers from chronic knee trouble, but it will be months before he is ready to play again.
Redknapp would normally demand that King, whom he rates as one of the best defenders in the country when fit, remain on stand-by for his opportunity but the new rules over squad size, which came into force at the beginning of the season, place him in a difficult position. The manager has little room for manoeuvre. The squad that he submitted on 1 September boasted the full complement of 25 senior players and he was also forced to omit Jonathan Woodgate, who was a long-term injury casualty and was not expected to be available before the turn of the year, which he was not.
But Woodgate came through a practice match last Tuesday against Queens Park Rangers and, although he was set to be loaned out, Redknapp has now said that he wants him in the squad. In addition, he has signed the defender Bongani Khumalo and the midfielder Steven Pienaar. Although he has loaned David Bentley to Birmingham City and Kyle Naughton back to Leicester City, he must lose one player to comply with the 25-man limit. And that is before he factors in any further signings.
There is the worry that the difficulty in moving on surplus players is hindering efforts to add new faces. Redknapp's priority is a centre-forward and he is monitoring Lu�s Fabiano of Sevilla, Ajax's Luis Su�rez and Diego Forl�n of Atl�tico Madrid. He has a long-standing interest in the Real Madrid midfielder Lassana Diarra.
He wants to move on Giovani dos Santos, Robbie Keane and Roman Pavyluchenko;. the latter is close to a switch to Sunderland. Niko Kranjcar and Jamie O'Hara could be loaned out.
Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2011/jan/24/harry-redknapp-ledley-king-tottenham-hotspur
Alexander Litvinenko Liverpool Health & wellbeing Bradford Bulls Mervyn King Tony Cottee
No comments:
Post a Comment