In a significant setback for England and Sale Sharks, international backrower Tom Curry is reportedly set to undergo surgery on his hip.
Curry has been sidelined from play since his return from this year’s World Cup, with the severity of the injury only now becoming apparent.
Since coming back to Manchester after helping his national team secure a third-place finish in the Rugby World Cup in France last month, the English back-row player has not featured in the Gallagher Premiership.
Prior to the tournament, Curry was already grappling with an ankle injury, which had ruled him out of all four games in the Summer Nations Series.
These recent developments add to the challenges faced by the talented flanker, who, in addition to his injury woes, was involved in an alleged racial abuse incident with Bongi Mbonambi during England’s World Cup semi-final loss.
“I’m waiting on a specialist assessment on his hip,” explained Sale boss Alex Sanderson a few weeks back.
“He has got a dicky hip, that’s the medical term for it.
“He came in (from the World Cup) and was alright but as soon as we trained with any intensity he stiffened up and it took us a while to free him up again and these are some chronic micro-tears in his labrum. So of them chronic, maybe one or two of them from the World Cup.
“We have to wait and see until this specialist tells us exactly what he has done and how he has done it and what kind of rehabilitation and treatment he needs.
“I’m not giving you anything clear because I don’t know myself, but it could be as little as a couple of weeks to rehab it because it has shown up well this week; it could be a lot longer depending on how much wear and tear there might be on his bone.
“He was in Harley Street this morning. I have had a missed call from our head of medical whilst I have been in meetings upstairs and I have run straight from that straight down to here because I knew I was late for you guys [the media], so I haven’t heard.”
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