Castleford Tigers provide update on when Jacques O’Neill could play

Castleford Tigers have made a statement of a number of injured players today.

The Tigers were thrilled to welcome Danny Richardson back to light training in recent weeks as he continues his journey back to full fitness after injuring his medial collateral ligament (MCL) and anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) last year.

“Danny is doing really well through his rehab. The surgeon said that it was a really serious injury because it was his MCL and ACL, so he had to wait for his MCL to heal before they operated on his ACL,” the club’s physiotherapist Matty Crowther said.

“The surgeon requested for him to have the year so I would say he will be fit around November time and that’s nine months to a year from his operation which is a blow for him but he’s flying through his rehab and we are keen to welcome him back to the squad as soon as he is fit enough”.

Young prop Kieran Hudson is also on the road to recovery from an achilles injury suffered in pre-season.

“It was a nasty one for Kieran, I really feel for him because he had a really good off-season to get to the fitness level that we wanted him to get to. The injury came off the back of the high-intensity work he was doing and an achilles is normally around a nine-month turnaround post-surgery so he’ll be looking at the back end of the season.”

However, Crowther disappointingly confirmed that Callum McLelland has suffered a further setback in his recovery.

“Unfortunately, Cal has hit another stumbling block on his return. We are currently assessing him.”

Furthermore, Matty gave an update on how Jacques O’Neill is faring in his quest to return to the field since coming back to the club a couple of months ago.

His return to the field seems quite a far bit off:

“Jacques is a bit away from getting on the field at the moment. We are working closely with him to try and get him more mobile. Since leaving the Tigers in 2021 with an injury, his career took him to a completely different line of work and coming back into a tough environment is a hard ask. We’ve got to try and make him as durable as possible to get him back into a Super League playing environment again.”