Fabio Capello has already seen three strikers drop out of his England camp due to injury and after last minute call up Darren Bent pulled out of his first training following the warm up, the Italian put in an emergency call to Aston Villa manager Martin O’Neill to see if Gabby Agbonlahor was available for selection against Ukraine.

Via Guardian

Capello said he was “touching wood” that there would be no further injury problems to his squad. “I think there’s a striker virus! My first idea was one particular style – fast, with movement. Now we have to have another style with [Peter] Crouch,” said Capello, confirming the Portsmouth striker would start alongside Wayne Rooney at Wembley tomorrow. “I’m sure we’ll play a good game tomorrow. Crouch has a different style, he’s not Bent or Heskey, but I’m sure Crouch is now the best forward I can put into the first XI.”

Villa striker Agbonlahor was left out of the Under-21 squad last week after being considered an injury doubt and has scored only once in his past 17 games for Villa and not at all since he last played for England. “[Bent] is injured, he has some problem,” added Capello. “He tried to stay here but after the warm-up there was a problem, so I decided to change players. We decided to choose Agbonlahor for the next game. I spoke with the manager of Aston Villa [Martin O’Neill] and he has been training the last two or three days very well. He is OK now.”

Image via Telegraph