Manchester United have suffered an injury blow ahead of their clash against Southampton at Old Trafford tomorrow, with Ashley Young ruled out for a ‘long time’ with a groin injury.
The winger was taken off during United’s 1-0 win over Liverpool last week with the injury, and Louis van Gaal has confirmed that the problem is severe enough for the 30-year-old to require surgery.
Phil Jones and Bastian Schweinsteiger are still out with ankle and knee injuries respectively, while Michael Carrick’s status was not confirmed, although he is still presumably injured for the Saints’ visit.
In his weekly interview with MUTV, van Gaal said:
Ashley Young has a severe groin injury, it shall be operated on, so he’s for a long time gone. It’s unbelievable, but we’re not lucky with that. Jones and Schweinsteiger cannot come back this weekend. You can count it and we have seven injuries.
The United boss did have some good news, with Adnan Janzuaj available for the first time since returning from a failed loan spell with Borussia Dortmund:
I think that he is available. He made his work in the training sessions and he has played one match, which is not much of course. He needs to play more matches, but he is available.
Van Gaal was also asked whether Cameron Borthwick-Jackson would be playing a bigger role in the first-team after Young’s injury. The Dutchman gave little away, but he did have praise for the 18-year-old:
He’s more or less a very good player for his age. He has shown already that he can cope with the pressure but, with youth players, the question is always: are they consistent? One match or a substitution is always good, but consistency is always the question mark.
