Donald to miss Ryder Cup after wrist surgery

Luke Donald has undergone wrist surgery and, like Tiger Woods, is out of next month's Ryder Cup and all golf for the rest of the season.

The surgery was performed in New York on Monday by Dr Andrew Weiland, who has performed a similar procedure on the baseball player Jason Giambi as well as another wrist operation on the former US Open champion Jim Furyk.

"The injury Luke suffered is not all that uncommon for golfers and baseball players and I'm confident he will make a full recovery with the proper rehabilitation and training," Dr Weiland said. "I'm extremely pleased with how the surgery went."

Donald, who was injured at the US Open in June, will begin strengthening exercises on the wrist in six weeks and should be able to begin chipping and putting after three months of recovery and rehabilitation.

For the past two months the 30-year-old, a member of the last two Ryder Cup sides, tried to rehabilitate without surgery, but after seeing little progress decided on an operation.

"While there is never a good time for an injury, the timing of this injury was especially disappointing for me considering that it forced me to miss the Open and it comes in a Ryder Cup year," Donald said. "But taking proper care of it is my highest priority and I'm encouraged by Dr Weiland's experience with this type of injury and his outlook towards my recovery and rehabilitation."

A week ago Donald was still hoping he might be able to avoid surgery and be a candidate for a Ryder Cup wild card. He acknowledged, though, that he faced "one of the biggest decisions of my career" and added: ""Obviously I would prefer not to have the surgery but I can only give myself so much time before I have to decide to go for an operation. Surgery can be risky and that is why I've tried to avoid it. I have damaged some connective tissue in my left wrist which holds one of the tendons in place.

"The good news is that there is nothing wrong with the tendon itself and if I was an ordinary member of the public it wouldn't make too much difference to my life. 95 per cent of the time my wrist feels normal. It's just that when it flexes in certain positions when I swing a club, the tendon pops out."

Donald has won all four of his foursomes and has an overall Ryder Cup record of five wins, one half and one loss.