Major League Soccer (MLS) star Khano Smith underwent groin surgery at a Boston hospital yesterday to raise serious doubts about his ability to regain match fitness in time for Bermuda's crucial away World Cup qualifier against Cayman Island in March.

The 26-year-old footballer had planned to return to national team duty for Sunday's home leg of the Island's World Cup qualifying encounter against Cayman Island, with senior national team officials going as far as to include the New England Revolution winger among a 25-man provisional squad that will be trimmed to 18 following tonight's training session at the National Sports Centre (NSC).

However, Smith's intended comeback hit a brick wall earlier this week when doctors at New England deemed the former Dandy Town striker unfit to take any part in this weekend's World Cup qualifier, with family sources confirming the player was scheduled to check into a Boston hospital yesterday to go under the knife.

"Although I can run I'm not at 100 percent at the moment, Smith told The Royal Gazette last week. "My groin still feels tight."

With the MLS player expected to be out of commission for six to eight weeks, it's now unlikely Smith will have any involvement in Bermuda's away World Cup qualifier with Cayman Island on March 30 or the Revs tour to the island next month.

"Khano actually informed us last night (Tuesday) that things did not look good and that he might have to have another operation," stated Bermuda Football Association (BFA) technical committee chairman Mark Trott. "And he wasn't too happy about that at all.

"As much as we would've loved to have had Khano's services this is the exact reason why we picked a training squad of 25 players. He really wanted to play in the matches (World Cup) but unfortunately that's football.

"You can't plan for the unexpected but you have to be prepared for it and that's why I have to compliment the coach (Keith Tucker) because until Khano was cleared by New England's medical staff we had no clue whether we would be able to use him. The coach went about things business as usual by literally planning without him just in case, and that's what you call good coaching."

Coach Keith Tucker added: "Khano's position in actual fact is where we're pretty solid," he said. "We've got Damon Ming, Domico Coddington, Lashun Dill, Cecoy Robinson and Tyrell Burgess.

"All of them can be very effective for us. We've been having a lot of fun watching Domico. He's very smart on the ball and has tremendous speed and vision. He should be among the starters for us.

"We have some entertainers and Domico's one of the best."

With World Cup fever permeating among the ranks Trott described morale in the camp as high, with each and every team member determined to pull their own weight.

"The players are just getting on with their business and are very excited," he said. "In some respect I think it's a case of the players showing maturity that they can go and produce the goods whenever we have a key player out for whatever reasons. I think they see this as an opportunity to go ahead and produce the goods in Khano's absence."

(Additional reporting by Stephen Wright).