Warrington Wolves head coach Sam Burgess has shared an injury update on club captain George Williams, who may well have played his final game for the Wire.
Williams was not named in Warrington’s 21-man squad with the club confirming that a neck injury would rule the England skipper out for an ‘extended period’ and an update has now been issued by Sam Burgess.
Speaking on Sky Sports ahead of Wire’s home clash against Wigan Warriors, Burgess has confirmed that Williams will head for surgery at some point with no defined recovery time, however, he stated that it could well be ‘next year’.
Of course, it’s previously been confirmed that Williams will leave the club and head to the NRL at the end of the season with the Dolphins strongly reported as his destination. As such, if the playmaker were to miss the rest of the Super League season through recovery then it would mean he has played his last game in a Warrington Wolves shirt.
“George will probably go for surgery at some point in the next week or two,” Burgess told Sky’s Jenna Brooks.
“There are a couple of things to figure out but it’s not going to be tomorrow. It might be a week, it might be two weeks time. It’s unfortunate for George and the club.”
He added: “There are a number of ways to look at it but we’ve decided to take the positive route and given the nature of where the injury is, we’re happy that we’ve got hold of it at an area where hopefully he can make a great recovery and we’ll see him back, if it’s not this year, then hopefully for next year.”
Pundits react to Warrington Wolves’ huge injury blow
Reacting to the news, Sam Tomkins said: “I think Sam Burgess has made it clear that it’s a very serious injury that George has got and I think George missing for this Warrington side is bigger than any other player missing for any other club.”
Fellow pundit Jon Wilkin revealed he’d suffered a similar such injury, adding: “I had the same injury as what George has got and it’s a tricky injury to come back from.
“Confidence, when you’ve got a spinal injury in your neck, coming back from that is not an easy thing mentally to get over. It’s a real challenging time for George.”
Should Williams’ recovery take much of, or all of, this year then it would also mean that the half-back would miss out on the World Cup. Newly-appointed head coach Brian McDermott had seemed to indicate that Williams would have been part of his plans when he confirmed that he had ‘no intentions’ of changing the national team captaincy.
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