Dutch, Danes wait on injured stars

Holland and Denmark are sweating on the fitness of injured stars Arjen Robben and Nicklas Bendtner ahead of their final Group E games on Thursday night.

Robben has failed to feature in either of Holland’s wins over Denmark and Japan due to a hamstring injury picked up during a warm-up win over Hungary.

“With Arjen we will wait,” said coach Bert van Marwijk. “If he looks well today he will be in the selection for the match.”

While the Dutch are already assured of a place in the last 16, Denmark must win against Japan to advance to the knock-out stages, but their hopes of doing so will be dealt a blow if Arsenal star Bendtner fails to recover from a groin problem in time for kick-off.

Denmark boss Morten Olsen said: “First of all we have to see if he can play and we will decide that [on Thursday].

“He has been doing quite alright. It’s by necessity that every other day he does not participate in the practise.

“Every time he has played we wait to see the reaction from his injury. There’s always a doubt when we have injuries like that, so we will have to wait and see.”

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