James Pattinson to undergo spinal fusion surgery in a bid to save his career

Australia fast bowler James Pattinson is set to undergo spinal fusion surgery to save his career for one last time after ruling himself out of the Ashes. The luckless cricketer has endured an injury prone career due to recurring stress fracture which is now threatening to end his stint. He was ruled out of the prestigious Ashes series against England last month and is expected to be on the sidelines for a long time. However, it is a huge step for him to undergo surgery as this will be his last chance to revive his international career.

It is being learnt that Pattinson and the doctors of Cricket Australia are in the discussions with the specialists in New Zealand including the one who saved the career of the best fast bowler of the Kiwis Shane Bond. Australia and in general, the fast bowlers are prone to stress fractures due to an enormous amount of bowling they do. In the annual injury report released by Cricket Australia (CA), stress fractures ranked no. 1 in terms of the most games missed by the players.

Few tests before the actual surgery

James Pattinson would be eager to go under the knife in a bid to make a comeback and wear the baggy green for his country. The procedure of the surgery involves a graft from his hip being fused to the problematic vertebrae with screws and/or wire. The sports science of CA Alex Kountouris explained that there are few tests before the surgery which the Victorian has to undergo. If he clears those tests then he would be deemed good to go for the surgery.

“Stabilise the area … like having a cast on your foot. There’s a few tests we have to do to see if he’s a good candidate. There’s a lot of people in Australia who do this surgery, it’s reasonably common but none of them have done any fast bowlers that have come back to the elite level,” he said as quoted by cricket.com.au. The preferred fast bowlers in the team Mitchell Starc, Josh Hazlewood and Pat Cummins have all struggled with stress fractures in the past but none of them underwent a surgery.

“It’s always better to do things without surgery than with surgery because of the inherent risk of any operation. We have some surgical options with James because of the complexity of his case,” said the team doctor Richard Saw and hinted that the spinal fusion surgery is a huge risk.