Newcastle United Football Club News

• Nickname:Magpies
• Founded:1881
• Manager:Alan Pardew

• Ground:St James' Park
• Capacity:52,193

Owen eyes return date

03 Dec 2006 - 13:58:52

Click To Enlarge

Newcastle United striker Michael Owen has reiterated his intention to return to action before the end of this season.

The former Liverpool and Real Madrid star is recovering from knee surgery after rupturing a cruciate ligament in the summer's World Cup finals.

There had been fears that Owen would not play until the start of next season, but he insisted: "I'm confident I'll play this season.

"It would be great if I could go into the summer knowing everything's fine.

"The turn of the year will be the important time when I have a scan, but I'm sure I'm going to come back as strong as ever.

"As long as the scan shows that everything has knitted together nicely, we can press on and hopefully I can start jogging in early February.

"The injury has been difficult because my one passion, apart from my family, has been taken away from me.

"It's been a long slog and there's still quite a lot of work to be done, but I can see the light at the end of the tunnel and I'm looking forward to playing again.

"I'll be 27 on 14 December so I'd like to think I'm just past the middle of my career and hopefully I have many more happy years on the football pitch in front of me.

"This is a clean slate and I hope I can get that speed back that I had when I was 18."