Soca Warriors striker, Stern John looks certain to miss this country’s crucial 2010 Concacaf World Cup qualifier versus El Salvador at the Hasely Crawford Stadium, Mucurapo from 7pm on Wednesday after suffering a suspected broken arm yesterday.
Making his debut for Coca-Cola Championship Division club, Crystal Palace whom he joined on a free transfer last month, John, T&T’s leading scorer of all-time lasted only 35 minutes after sustaining the injury following an aerial challenge with Plymouth goalkeeper Romain Larrieu.
While it may be a blow to Soca Warriors coach Russell Latapy as he gets ready to welcome home his overseas-based players today it turned out to be a blessing in disguise for Palace as subsitute Alan Lee, who replaced John, scored a second-half header to cancel out Krizztian Timar’s strike for Plymouth to earn Palace a 1-1 draw.
Following the match Crystal Palace boss Neil Warnock said of the injury to the T&T striker, “Stern’s having an x-ray now but it looks like the elbow has dislocated, which is obviously unfortunate. “But that’s the way football is, you have to get on with it. Considering what went on, I thought the players were terrific. “We created 20 chances and we had to work very hard not to win the game.”
In other matches, T&T goalkeeper, Clayton Ince held a clean sheet as Walsall won 1-0 at Brighton in the Coca-Cola Division One courtesy an own-goal by Andrew Whing in the 30th minute while Silvio Spann played the full 90 minutes for Wrexham in a 3-0 triumph over Eastbourn Borough in the Blue Square Premier League. Over in the Belgium Jupiler League, national midfielder Khaleem Hyland’s Zulte Waregem battled to a 2-2 draw with Racing Genk at the Regenboog Stadium to improve to two points from as many matches after a 1-1 draw with Lokeren to kick off the season.