England hopeful Kieron Dyer's World Cup hopes have all but gone after it emerged that his hamstring problems have returned, ending his chances of travelling to Germany.

On the same day that former England captain Alan Shearer was forced to retire from professional football after receiving a medial ligament injury and being ruled-out for the rest of the season, Newcastle have been hit by the injury to Dyer.

"I always believe the best policy is to be truthful, and I'd probably say Kieron won't be fit for the last two games. We need to get to the bottom of this problem. We are not going to try to rush him back to play a part next week or a part in the Chelsea game. That would be unfair to Kieron. We need to solve why his hamstrings after playing games tighten up and become strains.” Said Newcastle Caretaker boss Glenn Roeder.

“Kieron has probably now finished for the season and it's all about getting to the root of the problem and getting him back for pre-season fit and ready to train.”

The defeat of West Brom was Newcastle's fifth successive Barclays Premiership victory and took them level with sixth-placed Blackburn in the race for European qualification.

But the news that both Shearer and Dyer being ruled-out for the rest of the season, added to the late return of England striker Michael Owen from injury, will make the fight for a European place more difficult.

Roeder said: “The win keeps us in there, the win keeps us in with a chance. I said to the players yesterday when we discussed West Brom, they would come here today with what I would describe as a 'do-or-die' approach.

“It's do or die for us. If we don't win, we will probably go out of the European race.”

“But as we showed today, if we have to go to war without some of our first-choice players, we have young players who want to come in a fight for the club and wear the shirt, and that's what we will do in the last two games.

Bookmark/Search this post with:

delicious | digg | google | yahoo | technorati