Viduka back to boost Newcastle relegation battle

Australia striker Mark Viduka is ready to boost Newcastle’s bid for Premier League survival by returning from injury for Sunday’s clash against Tottenham.

Viduka, 33, was back in full training this week after a long-standing Achilles problem and has been named in Newcastle’s squad for the trip to White Hart Lane.

The injury-hit former Middlesbrough and Leeds star has made just six appearances this season and hasn’t scored for over a year. Newcastle have struggled in his absence and have just six games to climb out of the relegation zone.

Alan Shearer, Newcastle’s caretaker manager, said: “Mark Viduka has trained for the majority of the week and will travel with us. He has trained well.

“He’s obviously got a huge amount of talent and we believe if we can keep him fit, then he will play a big part in helping us.”

Viduka’s return is perfectly time for Shearer as Nigeria striker Obafemi Martins remains a doubt with the groin problem that caused his controversial late withdrawal from last Saturday’s 1-1 draw at Stoke.

Shearer insists there is no rift between himself and Martins after he initially expressed surprise when told Martins had ruled himself out, even though the former Inter Milan star had trained all week.

“That’s all forgotten about. I spoke to him again on Monday and there are no problems,” Shearer said.

“I said how much I was disappointed with the timing of things more than anything, and he totally understood that. But as an ongoing thing, no, that’s gone, forgotten about.”

Despite that battling draw against Stoke, Newcastle remain two points adrift of local rivals Sunderland, who are one place above the bottom three,

Sunderland host struggling Hull on Saturday, so Newcastle have slipped even further into trouble by the time they kick off at Tottenham 24 hours later.

But Shearer took heart from the way his players ground out a late equaliser at Stoke and the former England forward says morale has been lifted by that performance.

“Not only did we prove we are up for the battle and the fight and the scrap, but that we can also play a little bit, which has given everyone a big, big lift,” he said.

“It would have been a hell of a long week coming back from that game with nothing. But we got a point, so it has been a decent week for us.”