Thursday, November 12, 2009

Liverpool's Injured Glen Johnson Pulls Out Of England Squad


Glen Johnson has pulled out of the England squad to face Brazil on Saturday in Doha after picking up a slight injury in Liverpool's 2-2 draw against Birmingham City at Anfield on Monday night.

The 25-year-old played the full 90 minutes of the Premier League game before joining up with his England team-mates, where he underwent a routine recovery session while the rest of the squad trained at London Colney.

It was during this session that his knock became apparent and he will now return to his club for treatment, with the manager, Fabio Capello, at this stage not planning to call up another player for the trip to Qatar to face Dunga's team.

It leaves Wes Brown as the only right-back remaining, although James Milner or Shaun Wright-Phillips could drop back from midfield.

David Beckham is unavailable due to Major League Soccer commitments in the US but Capello's other 22 players from his original squad all trained ahead of the friendly against the South Americans in Doha.

England's fitness coach, Massimo Neri, led the warm-up for the players, then Robert Green, Ben Foster and Joe Hart trained separately with the goalkeeper coach, Franco Tancredi.

With Portsmouth's David James not in the squad due to injury, Green could be in line for a return to the starting XI after starting six consecutive matches before his dismissal against Ukraine, which led to Foster's introduction for the Belarus qualifier.

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