There’s little or no news on the back injury that kept Rio Ferdinand out of the game at Derby yesterday. The United defender missed the 1-0 win at Derby, with “back problems” sited as the cause. Ferguson reorganised by starting with O’Shea at right-back and shifted Brown alongside Vidic.

That meant that a host of fantasy managers lost a rather obvious clean sheet with no prior warning that Ferdinand was a doubt for the game before kick-off. We know for a fact that Ferguson wasn’t resting him – he’s already spoken out previously that he doesn’t believe that there is any need to rest either of his first choice centre backs. Where then, do fantasy managers stand on Ferdinand going into Wednesday’s game with Bolton?

On the face of it, if the injury is a minor one, the Ferdinand should return, with Bolton likely to cause a few more physical posers for the United defence. The fly in that particular ointment however is the Premiership fixture that follows four days later – Liverpool at home. Ferguson won’t want to take any risks of Ferdinand being battered and bruised by Davies, Diouf and their pals before going into the duel with Torres at Old Trafford a week today.

FPL managers who have selected Ferdinand are tied in for this gameweek – they can only sit back and hope for a Rio return on Wednesday. Even so, they and managers in other fantasy games, will need to be wary of any long-term issues this “injury” could cause. For me, the gap between Vidic and Ferdinand in fantasy terms has always been minor. Vidic is just one goal behind his centre-back partner and level on FPL bonus. However, if there are doubts over Ferdinand’s back, that’s the kind of injury that could reoccur and see him sit out further games, particularly on the eve of United’s Champions League Semi-Final ties. Vidic gets promoted back above Ferdinand in my thoughts and rankings then, regardless of what happens on Wednesday.