Fulham captain Tom Cairney is to consult several specialists over his persistent knee injury.
The Scottish playmaker has missed Fulham’s last five fixtures having been sidelined after aggravating a knee problem he had first sustained during a mid-season friendly last year. Cairney, hasn’t featured since Fulham’s 1-1 draw at Newcastle before Christmas and, although the problem doesn’t affect the same knee he injured in 2018, manager Scott Parker revealed this afternoon that the club will be seeking independent medical advice on how to manage the issue.
‘He’s struggling a little bit at the moment. He’s got an ongoing issue and it’s becoming a little bit of a problem really, so we’re going to refer him and get to see some specialists and get an opinion on that. I don’t foresee Tom being around for probably a few weeks from now at the earliest, and I probably won’t have a clearer picture on that until we get some information back from some specialists’.
Parker appeared to rule out as surgery as a solution in his comments during today’s press conference.
‘I don’t think it’s going to be the option. We just need to manage the pain, strengthen that area a little bit and see where he is. But at the moment it’s proving a bit too painful and we need to work out whether there’s other avenues we can take to speed up the process. We’ll go from there really.’
Cairney. who turned 30 on Wednesday, has made eleven appearances this season having battled a knee problem at the beginning of the campaign and had been left out of Parker’s starting line-up in favour of loan signing Ruben Loftus-Cheek before his knee complaint left him unavailable for selection.
