Tottenham's Aaron Lennon faces surgery dilemma

Aaron Lennon could be forced to choose between helping his club qualify for the Champions League or playing in the World Cup with England. The Tottenham Hotspur winger damaged his groin against West Ham on 28 December and was originally expected to be out for approximately three weeks, but a scan this week revealed his condition may be complicated by a hernia problem requiring surgery. Harry Redknapp, the Spurs manager, said the player wanted to continue with physiotherapy for another two weeks in the hope of recovering but indicated that if he has not regained 100% fitness by then he may have to decide between playing out the league campaign at less than peak condition before undergoing an operation at the end of the season – which is likely to rule him out of the World Cup – or having surgery now in the hope of returning for the climax of the domestic season and the World Cup. "The scan showed there could be a slight hernia problem," Redknapp said. "He feels he can get through it so we're going to continue to train him for the next two weeks and work with the physios and fitness people and see how it goes. If it's not good he'll have to have an operation. Maybe we could fit it in before the end of the season or maybe afterwards, but then he's got the World Cup coming up so it's a difficult one." Yesterday's signing of the 31-year-old former Chelsea and Barcelona forward Eidur Gudjohnsen from Monaco until the end of the season will go some way to mitigating the ill effects of Lennon's absence for Tottenham but Redknapp revealed that injuries elsewhere in the squad means further signings are required, with a central defender and back-up goalkeeper being the priorities. With Jonathan Woodgate out for the rest of the season with a groin injury and Ledley King beset by chronic knee trouble, Tottenham are heavily reliant on just two specialist centre-backs, Michael Dawson and Sébastien Bassong, who, the manager revealed, is also "nursing a knee problem". Having missed out on the signing of the Croatian centre-back Dejan Lovren, who decided to join Lyon instead, and been told by Palermo that the Danish international Simon Kjaer is not for sale, Redknapp has made Portsmouth Younes Kaboul his top target. He also plans to secure at least a back-up goalkeeper, and is in talks with Portsmouth over Asmir Begavoic. The Croatian international goalkeeper Stipe Pletikosa has arrived at White Hart Lane so that Tottenham can "assess his fitness" before deciding whether to sign him from Spartak Moscow. The midfielder Danny Rose is likely to leave White Hart Lane for Burnley until the end of the season, while several Premier League clubs have expressed their interest in loaning full-backs Kyle Naughton and Alan Hutton.