Super Bowl XLV injury update: Pittsburgh Steelers & Green Bay Packers

Any NFL Betting fan knows that one of the biggest contributing factors to a team’s performance is health – specifically which players are out of the lineup with injuries, and which players are playing hurt.

And at no time, in no game, are injuries a bigger factor than the Super Bowl.

Heading into Super Bowl XLV on Sunday, both the Green Bay Packers and the Pittsburgh Steelers have some injury concerns.

For the Packers, wide receiver Donald Driver is nursing a quadriceps injury, but the team said Friday he will play in Super Bowl XLV on Sunday against the Steelers.

Driver has been battling the injury all week. He was put on the Packers’ injury report Thursday, leading to speculation he wouldn’t play in Dallas. But Green Bay head coach Mike McCarthy told reporters Friday that while Driver was being held out of Friday’s practice as a precaution, he expects the veteran receiver to play Sunday.

For the Steelers, there has been a lot of speculation about starting center Maurkice Pouncey’s availability for the Super Bowl.

Pouncey suffered a high left ankle sprain in the Steelers’ 24-19 win over the New York Jets in the AFC championship, and has been seen on crutches and wearing a walking boot on his left foot.

But Steelers coach Mike Tomlin said Friday he expects Pouncey back at center on Sunday. Pouncey’s ankle sprain is a Grade II+, in other words, almost a complete tear of at least one of the major ligaments in the ankle. If this was a regular season game and not Super Sunday, there’s little doubt he would be out.