Devastating World Cup injury blow for Portsmouth man
News of a big fitness blow for the Portsmouth defender - who had his eyes on Socceroos World Cup involvement next month.
Hayden Matthews has been ruled out of the World Cup after suffering yet another injury setback.
The Pompey defender will not feature in next month’s finals, after picking up a new fitness issue at a pre-tournament training camp with Australia.
Matthews has been with the Socceroos at their base in Florida, with the 21-year-old aiming to make a late charge into boss Tony Popovic’s 26-man squad.
Those ambitions have now been dashed, however, with reports emerging the £1.25m signing is set to face up to six weeks out with the unnamed problem.
It’s the latest in a long line of injury problems for Matthews, who looked to be gaining momentum ahead of the finals after spending much of the second half of the campaign on the sidelines.
The 6ft 5in man suffered an ankle issue against Bristol City on New Year’s Day, following a tackle which earned criticism from John Mousinho.
That led to almost four months without first-team football, but Matthews then returned with back-to-back starts over the Championship finale to put him on Popovic’s radar. That came off the back of a season-ending ankle injury against QPR in February of last year.
Australia have a friendly against Mexico on May 30 off the back of the camp, before the squad is announced on June 1.
Even without suffering an injury, it would have been a challenge for Matthews to make it to the World Cup with strong competition for squad places in his area of the pitch.
He missed two Socceroos get-togethers, but told The News earlier this month he was hopeful a clear run of fitness would help his cause.
Matthews said: ‘The good thing for me was to get minutes at the back end of the season just to show what I can do and put my case forward to hopefully being involved in the World Cup.
‘After my injury, there were definitely times when I doubted I would get that opportunity, but now I am back in the camp and who knows what can happen.
‘My last involvement (with Australia) was in the October window, although I didn’t get any minutes. Then I missed out in November, while the March one was just when I was coming back from injury, so I missed out on that too.
‘I’ve been there before and they know me as a person and as a player. Now they have put that faith in me and trust me to give me the opportunity to hopefully show what I can do - and then I can go from there.
‘We do have a lot of quality centre-halves with Australia. There are 3-4 players in the Championship, one in Serie A, a couple playing in the MLS, so it’s one of our better positions. We have a lot of competition for spots.
‘It will be difficult, but I back myself and hopefully I can be involved in the World Cup come the time it starts.’