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Argentina's Manuel Lanzini to miss World Cup with knee injury

Argentina's West Ham midfielder Manuel Lanzini has torn his right anterior cruciate ligament during (ACL) Friday's training session and will miss the World Cup, the country's football association has announced.

Lanzini scored five goals and set up six more in 27 Premier League appearances for West Ham this past season and was included in Jorge Sampaoli's 23-man squad.

"Manuel Lanzini suffered, during this morning's training session, the rupture of the anterior cruciate ligament of his right knee," The Argentina Football Association (AFA) said on Twitter, though did not reveal how the injury happened.

The 25-year-old also missed the 2016 Olympic Games because of a knee injury.

Lanzini started in Argentina's 4-0 win over Haiti on May 29 in their only warm-up game ahead of the World Cup.

This is the second major setback Argentina have suffered in their preparations with first-choice goalkeeper Sergio Romero ruled out last month due to a knee injury. Sampaoli is expected to name a replacement ahead of Argentina travelling to Russia on Saturday.

The 2014 runners-up kick off their World Cup campaign against Iceland on June 16 and then take on Croatia and Nigeria in Group D.