SOCCER: Robbie Keane's chances of featuring in the Republic of Ireland's game against Russia next month were still hanging in the balance last night as the player and officials at Tottenham waited on the results of scans to assess the seriousness of the ankle injury he picked up in Tuesday night's 2-1 win over Australia.

Keane flew back to London yesterday to meet with members of the Tottenham medical team. He had a number of scans and according to Tottenham coach and Ireland assistant manager Chris Hughton, the extent of the problem will not be clear until the results of those tests come back, almost certainly within the next two days.

"As soon as it happened we were all very concerned," said Hughton last night. "But Robbie didn't seem so bad afterwards and we were relieved he had not hurt himself more badly. Now we're just waiting to see what the tests show.

"The first 48 hours or so are always the most difficult because, on the one hand, the player is naturally a little bit sore and on the other, you have very little information to go on. What we're trying to do now is avoid speculating on how he is until we know a bit more and that should be over the course of the next 24 to 48 hours."

Hughton declined to put any possible time frame on Keane's recovery but it does seem almost certain the 23-year-old will miss his club's Premiership game against Leeds on Saturday.

If the initial reports that the player has damaged his ankle ligaments prove well founded Keane would also be likely to miss the trip to Liverpool next Wednesday and the following weekend's home game with Fulham.

In the normal course of events with an ankle ligament problem he could expect to start running again around 10 days after sustaining the injury, which would leave the striker a week in which to recover some sort of fitness ahead of Ireland's vital European qualifier.

"One thing we have going for us here is Robbie tends to be a fast healer," said Hughton. "But for the moment we simply don't know what it is he has to recover from so we'll leave any conclusions until after the situation has been properly analysed."

Stephen Carr, meanwhile, is expected to be fit for Saturday's league game despite being taken off on Tuesday with a slight back and hamstring problem. "Where Steve was concerned the substitution was purely precautionary," says Hughton. "It was more or less a matter of stiffness and we're very confident he'll be okay for the weekend."

Similarly, there appear to be no real concerns about the fitness of Matt Holland for Charlton's trip to Wolves. The midfielder limped out of the international match with just 20 minutes played but the ankle injury he picked up early in the the match seems to be very minor and it is expected he will resume training over the next day or so.

If Keane is sidelined for the Russian game Brian Kerr will take some consolation from the performance of Clinton Morrison who, despite being well short of match fitness, scored the goal that made it six wins and a draw for Ireland since the current management team took over.

Morrison had played just two pre-season friendlies prior to coming on in the second half of Tuesday's game and he admitted afterwards the pace of the game had taken its toll. His goal, however, was his fifth in just 11 international appearances, most of which have come from the bench.

Tuesday's goal will not be long remembered for its quality but Morrison's movement while he was on, combined with the fact that he managed, on a couple of other occasions, to get into good scoring positions, may tempt Kerr into moving him above David Connolly in his pecking order.

The big problem for Morrison is that while Connolly looks set to play and, it appears, score regularly for West Ham in the First Division, it is far from clear whether the former Crystal Palace striker can nail down a regular place in Steve Bruce's Premiership side.

Switzerland, meanwhile, could be without highly-rated midfielder Hakan Yakin for their match against the Republic.

The player, who scored his country's first goal in October's 2-1 win in Dublin, has become embroiled in a dispute with PSG who have apparently pulled out of a €1.7 million deal with Basel for him after he decided to undergo surgery on a groin problem soon after arriving in Paris.

The club claim he misled their doctors regarding his fitness at his medical and have informed FIFA his contract with them is invalid. The operation could keep him on the sidelines for around two months.