Good news for Sales' knee

David Sales hits out in Northamptonshire's match against the touring New Zealanders last season

The knee injury sustained by Northamptonshire’s premier batsman David Sales is not as bad as initially feared.

Sales, 31, suffered ligament damage in a winter training session at Wantage Road last week.

Any damage to Sales’ knee will be of particular concern, as he was forced to miss the entire 2001 season due to an injury he picked up on the England A tour to the West Indies.

But Northants physiotherapist Barry Goudriaan moved to allayed the initial fears.

“The initial MRI result made it look more serious than it actually was,” said Goudriaan. “David has a small tear in a ligament on the inside of the knee.

“We will see him back in the Lynn Wilson Centre holding a bat as soon as February. Up to then he will be working very hard on a daily base on his rehab with Ross Dewar (physiologist) and myself.”

Sales captained Northants between 2004 and 2007, and has over 10,000 first-class runs for the county.

He burst onto the scene aged 16 with an unbeaten 210 on first-class debut for Northants, against Worcestershire at Kidderminster, the youngest player to score a County Championship double century.

Sales was his usual dominating self last season, scoring 1,137 first-class runs, including three centuries.