The road to recovery has hit a bump for Chiefs midfielder Siphiwe Tshabalala, who since joining The Amakhosi in January has been working his way to full fitness as he tries to work his way around a knee injury.

Tshabalala who arrived at Chiefs with the injury he picked up while still at his former team Free State Stars, underwent an operation on the knee a few weeks ago, and had been progressing well in his attempt to get back to full fitness.

The young midfielder had been doing rehabilitation work in the gym and was responding well to the exercise programme that he had been given. However, the initial progress being made by Tshabalala has been somewhat hampered over the past two days as his knee according to Chiefs physiotherapist David Milner had a relapse, subsequently the Chiefs medical team opted to let him rest it.

Milner explains further. “Siphiwe has recently experienced some swelling on the operated knee, so as a precautionary measure we gave him the past couple days to rest the time off has seemed to have done some good to his knee. We do expect to start his recovery process again early next week, we do believe that the necessary preventive measures were taken so as not to under do the good recovery work he has been doing and the rest will do him good”.

In the meantime striker Rotson Kilambe who limped off the field during Chiefs defeat to Golden Arrows on the 10th February, has made a full recovery from the hamstring injury which has kept him out of action since. As a result he has resumed full training with the rest of the team earlier this week and has not shown any signs of stress, and is expected to play some part in this coming weekends Charity game against Bloemfontein Celtic in Port Elizabeth. “I feel fine and I am really hoping to get a run against Celtic on Sunday, so that I can get my match fitness back as well as see if I have any problems with my hamstring” added Rotson prior to training on Thursday afternoon.

Midfielder Gert Schalkwyk who got a knock to the right knee while playing for the Chiefs reserve team during Monday’s 2-2 draw against the Orlando Pirates reserves., got back to training with the rest of the team on Thursday afternoon, after missing training on Tuesday and Wednesday.

The final piece of injury related information for the week sees defender Siphiwe Mkhonza back at the club's headquarters for the first time in more than a week. Mkhonza was out of action for the last week and a half as he had his tonsils removed, and was told by doctors to rest and not do any strenuous exercise.

Barring the missing players who are in action with their national teams this weekend, Kosta Papic will have his options open to him with a number of players returning from injury. The Chiefs coach has said that he will use Sunday’s game against Celtic in Port Elizabeth, to blood the likes of Thuso Phala and hopefully give Roston Kilambe the opportunity to find his way to full match fitness in order to open up his options for Chiefs clash with fellow Soweto rivals Moroka Swallows on the 1st April.