u00a0"It's too early to tell with any certainty as he had a highly unusual operation and it is difficult to predict how long it will take for the stress fracture to heal," Shuaib Manjra, head of Cricket South Africa's medical committee, told the daily 'The New Age' today.

"The best case scenario is that he returns to playing in around four months, but that could stretch to six months or even longer," he added, raising concerns that Smith may miss not just the tour by India in November but also the Test and ODI series in Abu Dhabi against Pakistan preceding that.