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No Scholes goals England forward ruled out of Club World Championship
Posted: Saturday January 01, 2000 12:36 PM
MANCHESTER, England (AP) -- England forward Paul Scholes on Saturday was ruled out of the inaugural FIFA Club World Championship because of his nagging hernia problem. The Manchester United star had already postponed an operation to cure the problem, which flared up again last week, and manager Alex Ferguson has decided to leave him behind when the team flies out to Rio de Janeiro on Sunday. "We won't take Paul to Brazil," Ferguson was quoted as saying in The Express. "He will see a specialist in the next few days and hopefully everything will be sorted out while we are competing in the world club championship." Ferguson has called up one of his backup youngsters, Mark Wilson, to take Scholes' place in an otherwise very strong squad as his team takes on Real Madrid, Brazilian clubs Vasco da Gama and Corinthians, CONCACAF champion Rayos del Necaxa of Mexico, South Melbourne, Saudi Arabia's Al-Nassr of Saudi Arabia and Morocco's Raja. United also is taking three goalkeepers -- Mark Bosnich, Raimond van der Gouw and Massimo Taibi -- and three more youngsters: Danny Higginbotham, Ronnie Wallwork and Jonathan Greening. Ferguson has decided to take a big squad because he is worried that the very hot temperatures might affect his players, who are used to mid-winter conditions in Europe. "It's 38 to 42 Celsius, which is very, very hot and that's the one concern I've got," said the manager who guided the Reds to an unprecedented triple triumph of the Champions League and domestic league and FA Cup titles last season and also won the Toyota (Intercontinental) Cup by beating Brazil's Palmeiras in Tokyo last month. "We hope we can handle it and we're obviously taking all the support and medical advice we can get. We're taking plenty of equipment with us and we have to think about things like the players' fluid intake, their rest and making sure they don't get too much sun. "There are all these things which I'm sure we can handle, but what we don't know is how they're going to handle the games, recovering and then playing again two days later." He said he will use his three substitutes in each match to keep players as fresh as possible. "I'll be changing my team around game by game and will be using the quota of three substitutes in every match," he said. "Hopefully we can handle it." When the United players return to continue their domestic program as well as defending the Champions League, they will be using a new 14.3 million pound (US$22.8 million) training complex at Carrington on the west side of Manchester. The new center replaces The Cliff, which has been the club's training ground for the past 50 years.
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