Heinze gets qualifying call

Manchester United full-back Gabriel Heinze has been named in a 26-man Argentina squad for next month’s World Cup qualifiers against Ecuador and Brazil.

National team boss Jose Nestor Pekerman has also called up Chelsea forward, Hernan Crespo, who is on loan at AC Milan.

Argentina are currently at the top in the South American zone standings and face Ecuador on June 4, while the derby against the Brazilian world champions is four days later.

Pekerman only called up foreign-based players and will name his Argentina-based footballers at a later stage.

Rumoured Tottenham target Andres D’Alessandro, Walter Samuel, Carlos Tevez, Pablo Aimar and Kily Gonzalez all return to favour.

Pekerman will likely field two completely different teams in both matches as he did in the previous two rounds.

He fielded his reserves for the 2-2 draw with Bolivia in La Paz – the world’s highest capital city – where football is played at 3600m (11,000 feet) above sea level.

He then played his regulars for the 1-0 victory over Colombia in Buenos Aires.

Squad: Leonardo Franco (Atletico Madrid); Fabricio Coloccini (Deportivo La Coruna), Walter Samuel (Real Madrid), Roberto Ayala (Valencia), Javier Zanetti (Internazionale), Leandro Cufre (Roma), Diego Placente (Bayer Leverkusen), Gabriel Milito (Zaragoza), Gabriel Heinze (Manchester United), Gonzalo Rodriguez, Juan Pablo Sorin (both Villarreal); Lucas Bernardi (Monaco), Aldo Duscher, Lionel Scaloni (both Deportivo La Coruna), Juan Roman Riquelme, Luciano Figueroa (both Villarreal), Luciano Galletti (Zaragoza), Pablo Aimar (Valencia), Maximiliano Rodriguez (Espanyol), Esteban Cambiasso, Cristian Gonzalez (both Internazionale), Andres D’Alessandro (Wolfsburg); Hernan Crespo (AC Milan), Javier Saviola (Monaco), Carlos Tevez (Corinthians), Cesar Delgado (Cruz Azul).