O'Shea and O'Dea add to Trap's injury crisis

GIOVANNI Trapattoni will be hoping to get lucky once again as he sweats over the fitness of two of his defenders ahead of the Euro 2012 play-off against Estonia next month.

The Ireland manager's plans for the November 12 trip to Tallinn took a series of blows at the weekend as John O'Shea hobbled off with a recurrence of his hamstring injury in the first-half of Sunderland's Premier League draw with Aston Villa on Saturday.

The Waterford man is almost certain to miss the play-off first leg as a result, and Trap's weekend went from bad to worse after centre-back Darren O'Dea was also taken off in the first half of Leeds' 1-1 Championship draw with Cardiff with a serious case of concussion.

With Kevin Doyle suspended and Shane Long battling to be fit for the play-offs while nursing knee and fibia injuries following a tackle from Aston Villa's Alan Hutton last week, the latest spate of injury woes will weaken Trap's hand further going into next month's must-win games.

There was, however, some good news for the Italian with the news that Robbie Keane played 82 minutes of LA Galaxy's MLS Conference play-off win over New York Red Bulls last night.