FORMER Sunderland coach Ricky Sbragia has backed Black Cats keeper Craig Gordon to bounce back from his injury woes and reclaim the number one jersey at the Stadium of Light.
Gordon has had wretched luck with injuries since making the move to Wearside back in 2007 from Scottish Premier League side Hearts and has yet to play for Sunderland since the 2-1 defeat at home to Tottenham back in February.
Sbragia, currently part of the coaching set-up for the Scotland national team and former manager at the Stadium of Light prior to Steve Bruce taking charge, concedes the 28-year-old keeper does have a lot to do to get back into the Sunderland first team, as well as re-establish himself in the Scotland squad.
Gordon is expected to make a full recovery from his knee injury by the end of the year – although it is the arm injury suffered in a clash with Tottenham’s Jermain Defoe back 2009 which Sbragia states is still a cause of concern.
However, once Gordon returns to full fitness, Sbragia insists he has the determination to fight his way back into the first team.
Sbragia said: “Craig has just been really unfortunate with injuries.
“I think he’s back training now, but the injury to his arm has caused him a massive problem.
“They took the pin out and he’s done it again and had the pin put back in.
“I’m not a specialist but sometimes they look and say there is nothing wrong, but in my experience if a player tells you that it’s not right, then I go with that.
“I feel sorry for him because he’s worked hard to get back in and for me he is still the Sunderland number one, despite others stepping in.
“But he’s missed a lot of football now, that’s the biggest problem, I notice he’s doing more on the telly now so I don’t know what’s he’s thinking.
“I hope he’s thinking he’ll get back in again. Unfortunately he’s not played for a year and he’s had an injury, then an injury then another injury.
“When he does get fit he’ll maybe have two, three, four years of good football in him. The rest is up to Craig.
“I think he’ll want to go on for as long as he can. He’s training now and he’ll have pencilled in a couple of reserves games, no doubt about that.
“The financial things won’t matter to Craig and he’ll just want to play football.”
