Ferrara injured again for Juventus

Juventus are facing a race against time to get captain and key defender Ciro Ferrara fit for their Champions League quarter final in March.

The player will have an operation on Wednesday in Turin on the broken leg injury that wrecked last season for him and kept him out of the national squad for the World Cup in France. He has played this season for Juve but showed little of the commanding form that led the side to a Serie A title and European Cup win two seasons ago. His lack of form has hit the Turin club's title chances badly and the new operation is to tidy up the healed fibia bone that was smashed at the end of 1997. The healing of the injury has taken longer than expected and the new operation puts him out of action until at least the first week of March when then club are back in action in the last stages of the Champions League - their last realistic chance of major success this season.