Tendulkar sidelined for at least three months

Sachin Tendulkar will be out of action for at least three months following surgery to his left hand carried out in the United States.

Doctors at Baltimore's International Centre for Limb Lengthening operated on Tendulkar on Tuesday (April 29) to fix a ligament and tendon injury in his left hand. "The procedure was successful. The surgery went very well," a doctor told the Times of India.

But Reuters reported that Karunakaran Nair, secretary of the Indian cricket board (BCCI), told them Tendulkar could be sidelined for up to five months. India's next major series is in October when New Zealand are due to tour. India then travel Australia at the end of the year.

Tendulkar picked up a bone injury at the base of his left ring-finger during India's tour of New Zealand late last year, but played in the recent World Cup in South Africa before undergoing surgery. It is the latest in a string of niggling injuries which have dogged Tendulkar in recent years. In 1999 he gave up fielding in the slips after suffering back spasms, and in 2001 he was laid up by a damaged foot and then an ankle injury.