Aston Villa striker Gabriel Agbonlahor is winning his battle to be fit for Sunday's Premier League clash away to Reading.Agbonlahor was forced to pull out of the England squad to face Switzerland with a hamstring injury and also missed Villa's 4-1 win over Newcastle a fortnight ago.

But the academy product is back in training and in contention to face the Royals at the Madejski Stadium.

Agbonlahor had been Villa's leading scorer with seven goals but in his absence has been taken over by John Carew, whose hat-trick against the Magpies took his seasonal tally to nine.

Villa manager Martin O'Neill said: "Gabby is fine. He has done a little bit of training. The pitches were too frosty on Tuesday but he did some training indoors. That was the first day he had joined in with us.

"Hopefully he will now get in a full spell of training and then we will see how he is. He has been raring to go now and has been for some days.

"We didn't let him join in in any of the training sessions during our short break in Malaga but that was purely precautionary."

Central defender Martin Laursen has shrugged off a heel injury and will be available for the clash in Berkshire.

O'Neill said: "Martin is okay. His heel has improved. He just needed to take a bit of time out which he has done."

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