Long road to recovery for Notts star Carter

Carter suffered his most recent stress fracture, diagnosed as a result of a non-union of the previous injury that blighted his 2013 campaign, during the warm-up ahead of the victory over Leicestershire at Grace Road.

The Lincolnshire-born bowler demonstrated fine form in Nottinghamshire’s early-season reckoning and was named player of the month for May.

“I’m very disappointed to be out injured as the team is playing extremely well at the moment and I was making a good contribution,” said Carter.

“I always want to play as much as I can and I’ve been managing pain in my back for a while now and strangely it felt the best it had for a long time just before the injury occurred.

“I don’t want to look too far ahead at the moment, but I want to have the operation and begin my rehabilitation as soon as I can because I know that I can contribute to a successful Nottinghamshire team in the years ahead.”

Nottinghamshire physiotherapist Jon Alty will play a leading role in Carter’s rehabilitation and has cited the non-union of an existing fracture sight as the cause of his enforced lay-off.

“Andrew worked exceptionally hard in the off-season to get himself fit and his form and wicket-taking saw him play more early-season matches than had been originally planned,” said Jon.

“We saw some early signs of the bone starting to break down and decided that he should only play white ball cricket for a while, but he suffered some pain at Leicestershire and we diagnosed a stress fracture in his vertebrae.

“He’ll have an operation in the next few weeks to pin the vertebrae and the recovery will take three to six months depending on what they find.”

New recruit James Franklin has checked-in at Trent Bridge while Nottinghamshire are working towards completing a deal for an additional bowler to feature in the final four LV= County Championship matches of the season.

Australian batsman Phil Jaques will spend the opening months of next season at Trent Bridge.

Jaques has been in fine form in the LV= County Championship and chalked up a classy hundred in the ongoing game against Somerset.

Coaching commitments in Australia prevent him from spending an entire season with Nottinghamshire but he has proved his worth with a series of high scores.

“We expect Alex Hales to have another shot at the IPL auction and having Phil around will cover his absence or we may even see them on the same teamsheet given recent form,” said Nottinghamshire director of cricket Mick Newell.

“He’ll be here for a similar period of time next season and we hope he can have a similar impact.”

Jaques will play his final game of the season for Nottinghamshire when they face Warwickshire in the LV= County Championship from Sunday.