STEVE Bruce has backed Phil Bardsley to make light of John O’Shea’s third injury in his brief Sunderland career.

The Black Cats are waiting to find the extent of the latest muscle problem to blight O’Shea’s time on Wearside, but it seems almost certain to rule him out of Saturday’s trip to former club Manchester United, and more than likely to keep him out of the Republic of Ireland’s two-legged play-off against Estonia to decide which team will reach Euro 2012.

Fortunately for Bruce, he has last season’s player of the year Bardsley fresh and ready to return to the starting line-up.

The latest injury is a recurrence of the hamstring problem O’Shea suffered on Sunderland’s pre-season tour of Germany. It delayed the start of his season until the visit of Swansea City. He then strained a calf in the international break which immediately followed.

Saturday’s appearance against Aston Villa was his seventh of the season, and was cut short after 36 minutes. His replacement that day, Bardsley, served a four-match suspension stretched over six weeks after stamping on Chelsea’s Juan Mata in September. His two subsequent appearances have come as a substitute, with Bruce unwilling to break up

a back four which was starting to perform well in his absence.

“Bardsley was our player of the year (in 2010-11), he did very, very well,” Bruce said.

“But Kieran Richardson played very, very well against (Theo) Walcott (in Sunderland’s 2-1 defeat at Arsenal) and did everything I asked of him. He did very, very well against (Bolton Wanderers’ Chris) Eagles as well (the following week).

“But make no mistake, Phil Bardsley will get his chance and when he takes it, will be hard to displace.”