WHEN you sit down to watch your first game of county cricket this season, spare a thought for one of the men you might have wanted to see, Kent’s injured Amjad Khan.

Khan faces a nine-month lay off after suffering a near-identical knee injury to that of England and Glamorgan paceman Simon Jones, who recently made his comeback after almost 10 months out.

Khan needed surgery to repair the posterior cruciate ligament in his right knee after aggravating an injury on England A’s tour of Bangladesh that he had initially picked up at a pre-tour training camp in Loughborough.

Unable to walk, drive or put any weight on the leg, the 26-year-old is using a manipulation machine to flex his knee for up to six hours a day to try and speed up the recovery process.

Khan said: "Once I had to fly back from Bangladesh I knew this was a fairly serious injury and that I would miss pre-season training but I didn’t expect to be out for the season.

"Finding I was out for nine months was a shock but Jones and Michael Vaughan have come back from the same operation."

He added: "For the injury to come so soon after getting my British citizenship and at the start of my first England A tour, you might forgive me for thinking that the timing of it all has been a little bit cruel."