Toon injury worries ahead of trip to Eastlands
Posted on November 16th, 2011 | 41 Comments |
There are a couple of ways to look at our next three games against City, United and Chelsea: either we’re in with a chance of some points if we have a fully fit squad or we have no chance and it’s therefore a ‘good’ time to suffer injuries, given that we have to suffer them at all. Either way, we do have injuries and I thought I’d round up the latest news I can find on them.
Cheick Tiote had a medial ligament injury which has caused him to miss the last two games. Apparently he’s been working with medical staff all week to try and get fit for Saturday’s game and as far as I can tell it’s about 50-50 as to whether he’ll be fit in time. It’s (usually) caused by a high-impact landing on a slightly bent knee and the fact that Tiote has any chance of being fit for the game at all probably means it’s the lowest grade of medial ligament injury, which can apparently take anything from 2-10 weeks to heal.
Presumably Guthrie will continue to be the man to step in for Tiote if the Ivorian remains injured.
Sylvian Marveaux, Yohan Cabaye and Leon Best all have (or had) the dreaded ‘Gilmore’s Groin’, which is more a description of the symptoms than the actual injury. The actual lesion can be in a number of different places and the recovery time depends on where it is and how bad it is.
Apparently in Marveaux’s case it’s pretty bad and he’s unlikely to be available for a few weeks. Yohan Cabaye played for France yesterday so he should be fit for Saturday’s game and there’s a reasonable chance that Leon Best could be fit too. He had a toe injury alongside his Gilmore’s Groin (by which I mean he had the injury at the same time, not that his toe is in his groin, which would be most unusual) and missed international duty for Ireland because of it but on Monday John Carver indicated that Best was likely to be fit enough to play on Saturday.
Gabriel Obertan has been out for a few weeks now with a toe injury and after scouring the press reports I can’t get much of a handle on whether or not he’ll be available. Some reports suggest he’s ‘in contention’ whilst others suggest he will be out for a number of weeks yet.
Shola Ameobi is on the long-term injury list at the moment with a hamstring problem and, I suspect, is unlikely to be back in consideration for at least 3 or 4 weeks.
Of course, even when players are declared ‘fit’ they often don’t make the starting XI as a manager will usually try to ease them back into things.
My personal opinion is that the only ones of the above listed injured players who might start against Manchester City are Leon Best and Yohan Cabaye. I think we’re likely to see Guthrie in place of Tiote and – at a guess – maybe Lovenkrands or Ben Arfa in the midfield in place of Obertan/Marveaux. I doubt Tiote will be risked unless he’s 100% fit but he might make the bench.
Hopefully we’ll find out a bit more about who’s in contention as the week progresses.
*Updated re the Cabaye situation.
That’s a pretty negative assessment of the sutuation. I thought Cabeye played for France and is fit? Marveux was quoted as being out for 4-6wks, so not available. Tiote has trained and was quoted as wanting to play and hoping he’ll get in ahead of Guthrie.