Manchester United captain Gary Neville could make his comeback game in next week's Champions League visit to Roma.

The right-back made one reserve comeback against Stockport County in the Manchester Senior Cup at the start of the month but suffered another KO soon after and hasn't featured in the second string XI since.

He was expecting to play in Thursday's match at Northwich against Sunderland but wasn't in the line-up, sparking more concern over his career.

But Reds' boss Sir Alex Ferguson has calmed the fears.

"Gary Neville is training with us," says Sir Alex. "If he comes through next week then I am going to take him to Rome with us and play him in the Roma game on December 12.

"He could have played in the reserves on Thursday but he wanted to continue his training with us and get to a good level with us.

"He is coming along. He is not far away now. There were no fresh scares. It begs the question when he didn't play in the reserves but he preferred to train with us.

"We agreed with that because it is important to get plenty of good training sessions before he starts playing in games."