Hargreaves suffers new injury blow

LONDON, England -- Manchester United's summer signing Owen Hargreaves has suffered another injury setback that is set to rule him out of England's Euro 2008 qualifiers against Estonia and Russia later this month.

Hargreaves had been expected to make his Champions League debut for United in their 1-0 home win over Roma, but instead he faces another agonizing month on the sidelines with a knee injury.

United manager revealed that the combative midfielder had needed an injection to treat tendinitis.

Ferguson did at least offer the small crumb of comfort that Hargreaves should not need surgery but he was clearly downcast as he said:

"Owen has had an injection in his knee and he'll be out for three to four weeks. "This is an option we had from the very start, and if it resurfaced again we (decided we) would do that.

"So he's had an injection to try to clear the tendinitis in his knee," he said.

Hargreaves' place in the England team has been taken by Aston Villa's Gareth Barry who impressed in the wins over Israel and Russia at Wembley. E-mail to a friend