Allen took a knock in the Aviva Premiership match against Northampton Saints and, although he finished the game, the injury did not improve as expected and he is now recovering from surgery.
“Anthony has had something called Compartment Syndrome which is compression of the muscle through a blood clot and he has had to have surgery to relieve the problem and pressure in his leg,” confirmed Tigers director of rugby Richard Cockerill.
“It is an unusual injury but thankfully our medical staff spotted it and it has been dealt with. It probably means three months recovery time for him.
“It is a very unfortunate injury. It was just a bang on the leg like a thousand others, but it didn’t clear up as we would have expected. The medical team were aware of the condition and he was sent to a trauma surgeon.
“It’s tough on Anthony because he has been playing very well for us, he is as consistent as anyone in the country in his position and there was perhaps an opportunity for him with England after being named in the Saxons squad. There is no doubt he is good enough to play at that level.”
Manu Tuilagi (chest muscle injury) and Tom Croft (knee) are still sidelined but Cockerill confirmed that Scott Hamilton and Steve Mafi are approaching full fitness and Blaine Scully has recovered from the injury picked up in the draw against Northampton. Mathew Tait and Matt Smith will also be back in action soon.
“It’s just down to bad luck,” said Cockerill. “Apart from Matt, who broke his thumb tackling in training, all the other injuries are from playing. We look at what we do all the time but you cannot control what happens in a game.
“We’ll just keep battling through. We’ve got Miles Benjamin back from long-term injury, Terrence Hepetema has experienced playing for us now and those other bodies will be back in due course.”
