Forster Ready To Make Injury Comeback

Last updated : 19 July 2003 By Rob Cooper
The twenty-nine-year-old goalscoring hero of last season could make his first appearance of the new campaign in a pre-season friendly next week.

Forster has travelled out to Sweden with the rest of the squad and could feature in a friendly against Borlange next Thursday. However, the former Brentford man is unlikely to be risked by manager Alan Pardew when the Royals take to the field to play Galve on Tuesday.

The electric forward, who at times tore defences to shreads last season, is now looking as if he will be ready for the new season which begins on August 9th having come through fitness tests with flying colours.

Physio Jon Fearn was delighted that the brightest firework in Reading's glittery forward line-up is nearly ready to make his comeback.

"Today we re-tested the movements and he has come through with no problems at all. We'll look at his progress over the next couple of days," explained Fearn, speaking to readingfc.co.uk.

But with competitive action for the Royals still a while off, the club won't be seeking to exacerbate the situation by bringing Fozzy back too soon.

"The most important thing to do at this stage is not to push him too quickly," added Fearn.

"The last two weeks have been very intense trying to get him right and we don't want to lose the good outcome we've got in our sights."

Fears that Forster would be forced to miss the start of the season reached a crescendo on Monday when it emerged that the pacy forward was to see a specialist due to continuing niggling pain that his ankle was giving him.

However, now the striker has had an MRI scan, it appears that anyone who lost sleep fearing that Forster could miss the first few weeks of the season can rest easy.

Originally it had been hoped that Forster would recover from his injury in 7-10 days, but those predictions proved wildly optimistic.