Roman Pavlyuchenko explains Fulham absence

Tottenham striker Roman Pavlyuchenko has revealed that he was left out of their squad to face Fulham on Sunday due to a back injury.

Despite a lack of Premier League game time this year, Pavlyuchenko has been a regular on the Spurs bench. However, he was omitted completely from Harry Redknapp's squad to travel to Craven Cottage.

The Russian first noticed the problem in Spurs' 1-0 defeat to Rubin Kazan in the Europa League last Thursday.

"I got this injury during our game against Rubin," he told Sport Express.

"I felt a pain in the back ten minutes before the break. I felt even more pain in the second half and in this condition I wasn't really useful for my team so I asked to be substituted."

Pavlyuchenko has scored two goals in four Europa League appearances for Spurs this season.