There can’t be many doctors with a client list that really reads like a who’s who of British based footballing talent over the past ten or fifteen years but US knee specialist Dr Richard Steadman is one whose name keeps popping up.

Famous for operating on Alan Shearer, Henrik Larsson, Paul Gascoigne and, recently, Michael Owen, Dr. Steadman has been chosen by Fulham to be the man they entrust to put Jimmy Bullard’s cruciate ligament back into working order as the crocked midfielder begins the first tentative steps towards getting over his horror injury against Newcastle a week and a half ago.

Bullard flew out to America on Monday to see the top doctor with the full financial backing of Fulham owner Mohammed Al Fayed and the support of manager Chris Coleman who knows the pain of long term injury himself from his own playing days.

Despite only joining the London club this summer Bullard has made an immediate impact which makes his season ending injury an even bigger hammer blow for Coleman and co. although they are looking at the long term picture when it comes to Jimmy’s recuperation:

“We’ve sent Jimmy to Richard Steadman because he’s a very, very good player,” Coleman explained. “He’s someone who will be a massive influence on this football club in the next three or four years.

“Jimmy has to see the best guy available. Any players who will be at this club for a long time will get the best treatment.”

With Luis Boa Morte fracturing a cheekbone in action last weekend as well, it hasn’t been the best of times for anyone connected with Fulham over the past couple of weeks and fans of the club are hoping that Dr. Richard Steadman can help provide some reassuring news after looking at Jimmy Bullard.

I have to say that it looked like an absolutely horrific injury and it’s a great credit to the Fulham medical team who worked to relocate Bullard’s dislocated knee on the pitch and the player himself that they are even talking about looking ahead now at getting his operation over and getting him back on the recovery trail.

Good luck in the US Jimmy, all football fans in the UK hope oyu get some good news.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, September 19th, 2006 at 2:37 pm and is filed under Fulham. You can subscribe via RSS 2.0 feed to this post's comments. Both comments and pings are currently closed.