O’Shea and Hargreaves near United return

REPUBLIC of Ireland defender John O’Shea or England midfielder Owen Hargreaves could be back in the Manchester United squad to face Chelsea today.

United boss Alex Ferguson yesterday revealed he is considering bringing long-term injury victims O’Shea and Hargreaves into the fold over the coming week.

O’Shea has been out since he suffered a dead leg in Ireland’s World Cup play-off defeat to France in November. Hargreaves has not played a first-team game since September 2008 after undergoing surgery to both knees.

With Hargreaves not part of United’s European squad and unavailable for Wednesday’s quarter-final second-leg against former club Bayern Munich, Ferguson may have the 29-year-old on the bench today, with O’Shea a sub on Wednesday.

“I may use one of them as sub tomorrow and the other on Wednesday,” said Ferguson.

“John O’Shea in particular has done a lot of work. The boy has come on terrifically well in the last two or three weeks. If I include one tomorrow and one Wednesday it’ll give them the confidence that they are back. That’s what they need.”