The 23-year-old was forced off in the opening stages at St James Park & visited the specialist at the earliest opportunity to discover the extent of the problem.

After receiving the news, he could now be back in contention to play in a matter of days as supposed to weeks.

Artell said: "George went to see the specialist yesterday (Monday), it's good news.

"It's not as bad as we feared. He's hyper-extended his knee & we need to play it by ear really.

"We can't force Mother Nature but we can give her a helping hand. That's what we'll be doing this week with George.

"In terms of availability for Saturday, at the moment we don't know. We'll give him as much time as we can, if he's fit he's fit, if he's not he's not.

"Alex (Kiwomya) got a couple of studs marks on the top of his foot with the pain intensifying through the game so he had to come off, but he's fine now & trained fine yesterday - other than that we're fine from the weekend."