Saints' Sculthorpe to miss rest of season

Sculthorpe, 29, was carried off on a stretcher during training on Friday but the full extent of the injury was not revealed until he had a scan on Saturday morning, a few hours before Saints beat Warrington to reach the semi-finals of the Challenge Cup for a seventh consecutive year.

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Injury blow: Paul Sculthorpe

A devastated Sculthorpe, who has fought his way back to fitness from two major knee operations and back problems in the last two years, said: "I can't believe my bad luck but I won't give up. My knees are fine now and I can handle the rehab again. It is just freakish that I have picked up another bad injury.

"I had been training for about 15 minutes when I suddenly felt as if I'd been shot in the back of the leg. I've never known pain like it.

"I had three scans and was praying it was only a problem with my calf, because the first scan showed I had torn the muscle. But I had also snapped the Achilles and that means my season is over."

This latest injury blow could hardly have come at a worse time for Sculthorpe, who is in talks with Saints over a new contract and had high hopes of captaining the world club champions in the first Challenge Cup final at the new Wembley in August.

Saints paid a then worldrecord fee for a forward of £370,000 when they signed him from Warrington in 1997 and he has already captained them to two Challenge Cup triumphs, at Cardiff in 2004 and at Twickenham last year.

After his second knee operation last autumn, the twotime Man of Steel withdrew from the Great Britain squad for the Tri-Nations tournament Down Under and relinquished the captaincy to Jamie Peacock of Leeds.

Sculthorpe, due a testimonial with Saints next season, will travel to London today to see the surgeon who fixed his knee last September.

"I will see who he recommends to repair my Achilles and take it from there," he added.

"I'm gutted but I will be back next season."

Warrington's Adrian Morley has been named Great Britain captain for next week's Frontline Test match against France at Leeds.

New Great Britain coach Tony Smith had already told several senior players that he planned to blood some new faces against the French.

Salford City Reds have called a press conference for this morning to name their new head coach.

Former Saints and Hull coach Shaun McRae is the hot favourite to succeed Karl Harrison, who was sacked last month.

Also on the three-man shortlist for the job is former Bradford and Great Britain hooker James Lowes, who was Harrison's right-hand man throughout his five seasons at The Willows.