Owen Hargreaves Sustains Shoulder Injury, Out 4 Weeks

Owen Hargreaves lasted six minutes in his last injury comeback but won't even get that far this time after suffering a dislocated shoulder during training with Manchester United. The injury, which occurred, somehow, while Hargreaves was contesting a header, is expected to keep the Canadian-born England international out of the lineup for several more weeks, and with his contract with United due to end in June this could represent the final blow to an incredibly disappointing career with the most decorated club of the Premier League era.

Hargreaves, who cost 17M when he transferred from Bayern Munich in 2007, has had a series of major injury problems with United. Patellar tendinitis was a particular problem, but Hargreaves has tended to injure himself more or less immediately following a comeback. After featuring in 34 games in the 2007/08 season, he's played in just five matches since, and at one point went over two years without being fit enough to start a match - whereupon he tore his hamstring five minutes into United's home game against Wolverhampton. Although it had been hoped that the man who so impressed in the 2006 World Cup would be able to provide some sort of miracle resurrection to his career as the season entered the stretch run, that's been rather dashed by this latest blow.

Bad luck for both Hargreaves and United, who've been looking desperately short of central midfielders lately.