Beckham blow leaves door open for young guns
Reuters - Monday 15 March 2010, 11:35
LONDON - While the injuries are
beginning to mount up for Fabio Capello, the England manager can
take some comfort from the fact that, in the case of David
Beckham's position, he has a wealth of alternatives.
Beckham's hopes of making the World Cup are negligible after
he tore an Achilles on Sunday, with the 34-year-old scheduled
for surgery later on Monday.
In an all-too-familiar scenario for England managers over
the years, the setback is one of several in recent weeks for the
squad and almost certainly will not be the last as the gruelling
and relentless English season lurches into its eighth month.
Wes Brown has fallen prey to the curse of the metatarsal - a
broken toe that in the past has previously cut down Beckham,
Gary Neville, Michael Owen and Wayne Rooney twice - and is
fighting to make the World Cup.
Capello's other main right-back, Glen Johnson, is only just
tentatively returning to action after ankle ligament damage that
kept him out for more than two months.
Left-back Ashley Cole has a broken ankle that will at best
leave him desperately rusty and at worse rule him out of the
tournament altogether, while his obvious replacement, Wayne
Bridge, has retired from the international game after his
personal problems with centre-back and former captain John
Terry.
The new captain, Rio Ferdinand, has struggled all season
with a back injury and has struggled to put together a
consistent run of appearances for Manchester United while Aaron
Lennon, a speedy alternative to Beckham on the right, is
struggling with a troublesome groin injury that has kept him out
since December and is seriously damaging his World Cup
prospects.
With the leading English sides still facing a potential
dozen games in the Premier and Champions Leagues there is plenty
of time for more already-ailing bodies to be struck down before
the June 1 deadline for World Cup squads to be named.
"David is a great professional and has worked very hard to
be ready for the World Cup, so missing it will be a big blow,"
Capello said.
However, the silver lining for the Italian coach is that
Beckham's position is the one where there is the deepest cover
and removed the decision of whether it was a sensible use of a
squad slot to take a player only ever likely to feature as a
substitute.
Lennon, Theo Walcott and Shaun Wright-Phillips have all
featured there in the last year and all bring a measure of pace
and direct running that Beckham could not match even in his
prime.
True, the three of them combined struggle to deliver the
quality of cross and dead ball accuracy of Beckham but one of
the trio was always likely to be Capello's first-choice starter.
James Milner and Steven Gerrard, both more effective in
central midfield, can also operate well on the right, while
David Bentley adds a further option having begun to rediscover
his form at Tottenham Hotspur.
With the shadow of Beckham removed, it could pave the way for
one of them, and Walcott appears to be in pole position, to
stake a firm claim for the role and move England into a new era.
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