Injury-hit Jeffers heads to Australia in attempt to kickstart career

The former Arsenal and Everton forward is on trial with the Newcastle Jets in a 10-week guest stint with the club.

Injury-plagued Jeffers, who scored against Australia on his only appearance for England back in 2003, arrived in Newcastle last weekend and has been training with the Jets under the watchful eye of head coach Branko Culina.

Jeffers has been a free agent since being released by Wednesday in May and sees the chance to join the Jets as a way to re-ignite his career.

"You can see he has got a better touch than the average player but his fitness is a fair bit off, but you can only help that if you are training I suppose," Culina said.

"But we will make a decision on him in the next couple of days. We don't want to keep him here for too long if we don't sign him,"

Culina feels 29-year-old Jeffers does not fit easily with his side's style of play, but with captain Michael Bridges sidelined for another two months with a knee injury and New Zealand international Jeremy Brockie also injured, the Jets are in dire need of a proven goalscorer.

"Looking at him he is not a target man, and it would require us to change our style of play, but if it meant scoring goals then I would be prepared to do that," Culina said.

"But it is a big outlay so we have to feel quite confident he can do the job for us."

The Owls will not be signing on-trial defender Sam Sodje.

The former Charlton centre-back has suffered a number of injuries during his two-week trial spell. The 31-year-old London-born Nigeria international is currently without a club after leaving Greek club Xanthi.

His brother Akpo played for Wednesday in 2007-08, scoring nine goals in 41 appearances before moving to Charlton.

Wednesday are under a transfer embargo and unable to make signings until they settle a 600,000 debt to HM Revenue and Customs.

Doncaster Rovers' chairman John Ryan will give manager Sean O'Driscoll the funds to replace injured striker Billy Sharp.

Rovers' record signing is out for up to six weeks with a hamstring tear suffered against Sheffield United.

Ryan said: "It won't be financial restrictions, it will be more the fact can he find the right player to come and play for us.

"If anyone can do it Sean can – he came up with Jordon Mutch and Jay Emmanuel-Thomas last year."