Beleaguered Newcastle United have been dealt a major blow with a groin injury ruling star forward Michael Owen out of their weekend clash against Mark Hughes’ Manchester City.
Joe Kinnear’s side are currently third from bottom in the Premiership table, and have picked up just one point from their last five games. Their misery is compounded by the fact that Owen is their top scorer in the league this season, with three out of their seven coming from him.
Bob Bradley’s youthful USA squad were handed their first defeat in qualifying as Trinidad and Tobago beat them 2-1 in Port of Spain. The win was the Soca Warrior’s first over the USA since 1994, and also puts them in prime position to join the USA as one of the two qualifiers from Group 1.
In the earlier leg between these two teams last month in Illnois, the USA had run out 3-0 winners thanks to goals from Michael Bradley, Clint Dempsey and Brian Ching.
According to reports in the Spanish press, Manchester United are considering a £5 million pound bid for Real Valladoid keeper Andres Sergio Asenjo. The 19 year old stopper is being looked at as a long term replacement for Dutch veteran Edwin Van der Sar, who is hanging up his boots soon.
This is not the first time a major club has shown interest in Asenjo. Aston Villa, Everton and Tottenham Hotspur were linked with him, and so were Barcelona. Asenjo reportedly had a £3.3m buyout clause (4.5 million euros) in his contract which was increased to around 6 million euros after he signed a new deal in January 2008.