Kumble’s shoulder problem similar to Srinath’s — Fergusson

But, he said once Kumble was relieved of the problem, he could play for another 10 years easily.

Kumble, who complained of the problem after the recent ICC knock-out tournament in Narirobi, was ruled out of the series against visiting Zimbabweans.

Asked whether an immediate surgery was required, Fergusson said he had given some instructions to Kumble’s personal therapist and also to team physio Andrew Leipus. A decision on surgery would be taken after observing his progress.

Fergusson, who had earlier treated Srinath, said he was in constant touch with the two and enquiring about the progress.

Kumble had given him a video cassette of his performance against Pakistan in New Delhi last year when he equalled the world record taking 10 wickets in one innings. This would help him in studying Kumble’s bowling action and also to suggest necessary improvement, Ferguson said.

Asked why Indian cricketers were prone to such problems, Fergusson attributed it to large number of one-dayers played without rest.

Ferguson was here in connection with two-day “Update on Arthroscopy and Arthroscopic Surgery” organised by Ormed Medical Technology Ltd, a member of HUG group, Germany.

According to Ormed sources, Ferguson is making a CD on `do’s’ and `dont’s’ for the benefit of Indian sportsmen, particularly in sports like cricket, basketball, discuss throw. This would be released sometime in the first quarter of 2001, they said.

Earlier, addressing a press conference, Fergusson said except Srinath, Ajay Jadeja and Kumble, no other Indian cricketers had approached him or sought his advise.

Explaining about arthroscopic surgery, he said this was an endoscopic surgery of the various joints like knee, shoulder, ankle elbow and wrist and could be done without opening the joints. At present, there was no need to open the joint and perform surgery except for total knee joint replacement.

Even for shoulder and other joints, except in the rare circumstances, there was no need to open the joint to perform surgery, Fergusson pointed out.

Saying that this technique was mostly used for athletes, whose joints were put to enormous strain leading to tearing off of cartilage, ligaments and other vital structures, he said with timely arthroscopic surgery, the athletes would be able to get back to their original level of activity soon.

Dr David Rajan, the organising secretary of the conference, “Arthroscopy Update 2000,” said the concept of this technique was of late catching up with sportsmen.

The objective of the conference was to impart experience and knowledge of experts like Fergusson to local surgeons to keep them abreast of latest developments in the field, he said.

He said the knee injury surgery of two young Tamil Nadu basketball players would be shown live through CCTV to about 120 delegates during the conference.