Wes Brown is out of Sunderland's opening Premier League game with Fulham.
Manager Paolo Di Canio confirmed Brown will miss the opener against the Cottagers after suffering a slight recurrence of a knee injury in training last week.
"I want to think positive. We couldn't expect to see Wes Brown go all the way through pre-season, but the problem was a knock he received in a session last week, and for that we don't want to risk him.
"Even if he misses the first game, he waited nearly a whole year so it's not an issue. It's important that he's okay and in the next few days he can join the team and be ready to be selected for any match.
"He probably couldn't expect himself to go through all the training, but he never missed a session and he was surprised and happy and so were we.
"It's disappointing obviously, because he did everything until 12 days ago, but it's important there are no problems there."
