Vassell injury creates striker shortage for Eriksson

England coach Sven-Goran Eriksson has only Emile Heskey and Wayne Rooney fit to play up front in Sunday’s friendly with Denmark.

Eriksson is without Aston Villa striker Darius Vassell after the Swede’s decision to allow him to play in a friendly for his club in Dubai back-fired.

Eriksson was mindful of the fact that Vassell was lacking in confidence after failing to score in the Barclaycard Premiership this season and permitted him to turn out against Al Nasr after being contacted by Villa manager David O’Leary.

It was a risk given the shortage of forward power at Eriksson’s disposal, although the move initially looked to have paid handsome dividends as Vassell was on target four times for his club in a 5-2 win.

But any positives in that direction soon dissolved when news filtered through that the 23-year-old had suffered a knee injury.

That will almost certainly leave Eriksson with a forward partnership which picks itself in Rooney and out-of-form Heskey, unless he opts to draft in another forward as cover.

Vassell, whose only goal this season came against Wycombe in the Carling Cup in late September, underwent a scan today.

The discovery of fluid on the knee meant he was unable to fly back to England with his Danish colleague Thomas Sorensen and join up with Eriksson and his squad for their training session in Manchester.

He will now return with his Villa team-mates late on Friday afternoon and then be assessed by the England medical staff on the eve of the first warm-up international in the build-up to the Euro 2004 finals.

But it seems unlikely that Eriksson would want to risk a player, who has produced many of his best performances for his country as a substitute, in what is after all a non-competitive game.

Football Association spokesman Adrian Bevington confirmed: “Darius Vassell played in Dubai on Wednesday night with the permission of Sven who had a previous arrangement with David O’Leary.

“Unfortunately, despite scoring four goals, Darius picked up a knee injury which resulted in him having a scan in Dubai.

“He has got fluid on the knee so was unable to fly on Thursday and he will now come back with Aston Villa on Friday afternoon.

“He will then be assessed by our medical staff on Saturday to see whether he is in a position to proceed from there.”

Eriksson will definitely be without the services of Steven Gerrard, who this week committed his long-term future to Liverpool.

The midfielder withdrew from the squad with a back problem after discussions between his club and England officials.

Skipper David Beckham joined up with the squad on Thursday and, although he was confined to having treatment at the team headquarters on his back injury and did not train, he is expected to be fit to play at his former stomping ground.

The one real ray of sunshine was the return to training of Rooney, who looked lively and to be suffering few effects of his recent bout of flu.

The Everton star had been regarded earlier in the week as a major doubt after missing his side’s 2-l defeat at Blackburn on Monday.

But the 18-year-old has made a rapid recovery in the past 24 hours, much to Eriksson’s relief.

The trio of newcomers in Charlton’s Scott Parker, Tottenham’s Anthony Gardner - a replacement for the injured Gareth Southgate – and Chelsea’s Glen Johnson were put through their paces at Manchester United’s former training ground at The Cliff.