Eriksson: do not rely on Elano

Sven-Goran Eriksson has told his Man City side that they must not continue to rely on Elano to provide the goals and assists to help Manchester City stay in the top half of the table. Elano is currently out with a hamstring problem.

Eriksson told the Manchester Evening News: "Darius Vassell, Emile Mpenza, and Michael Johnson all trained but we must wait another couple of days to see if Elano will make it or not.

"He has not trained with us this week and has a problem with his hamstring. I expect he will have another scan tomorrow or Friday and we will see how we go from there.

"If you look at all the goals this season then you must say that Elano is important to us. Between him and Petrov they have probably been involved in 80-85 per cent of the goals we have scored.

"But we have a lot of other good players and we cannot afford to stand or fall by whether Elano is there."