Andrew Driver will decide on cap career by Christmas

ANDREW Driver's deliberations about his international career will be over before Christmas, the English-born Hearts winger has promised.

The 21-year-old is torn between continuing to make himself available for England or committing himself to Scotland. The need to make such a decision follows the recent change in Fifa rules which permit those schooled in a country for more than five years to represent the national team, even in the absence of any bloodline. Driver, who was born in Oldham but moved to North Berwick ten years ago, has already played for the England Under-21 team.

He won't, however, be named tomorrow in the Scotland manager George Burley's squad to face Wales later this month amid continued debate about the player's own intentions. Driver did little to ease the speculation yesterday but confirmed he will have informed the relevant governing bodies of his decision before the end of next month.

"It won't be that long," he said, when asked whether Christmas is a realistic deadline. "It will be in the near future. You don't want to drag it on. If you drag it on, it makes it look as if I'm stalling, which shows disrespect to both nations."