Full extent of Moody injury expected to be known today

Moody limped out of Saturday’s 23-19 win against Wales with a recurrence of the knee ligament problem that kept him sidelined for England’s RBS Six Nations title campaign.

The England captain has had his right knee scanned and the results were yesterday being studied by the team’s medics, with a conclusion expected today.

Johnson said: “The bad news would be that he has got an eight-week injury that would put him out of the World Cup. I don’t think it is going to put him out of the tournament, but we’ll see.

“It is not great that he has got an injury, but I don’t think it is on the very bad side of knee injuries.”

Moody, who played with heavy strapping on his left leg, was confident on Saturday night that the injury was nothing more than a “tweak.”

The Bath flanker will not play in Saturday’s return fixture against Wales at the Millennium Stadium and he has only featured in five games since suffering the original injury in January.

But Johnson, who has to finalise his 30-man World Cup squad on August 22, is not concerned by Moody’s lack of game time ahead of the tournament in New Zealand.

“The guys like him, who have played a lot of rugby over the last 10 or 15 years, can handle that better than guys who are fairly new to it,” said Johnson.

“In an ideal world he is fit and available to play the next two (World Cup warm-up) games but we will have to see how it goes.”

Toby Flood, meanwhile, believes his challenge against Wales on Saturday will not only be to convince Johnson he is England’s best fly-half for the World Cup – but to convince the entire country.

Flood, 26, has been England’s first choice since replacing the peoples’ favourite Jonny Wilkinson at the end of the 2010 Six Nations.

Wilkinson made an impressive pitch to reclaim the position with a man-of-the-match performance against Wales, but Flood will get his opportunity to respond in the return match at the Millennium Stadium this weekend.

“I don’t think I’ve ever been in charge of that 10 shirt,” said Flood.

“It has always been hugely difficult for me to have it. There will be 58 million people in England who probably think I shouldn’t be in charge of it.

“The scenario has always been that Jonny, given his opportunity, will have a standout game and he did that.”