Manchester United have sent Owen Hargreaves to the United States to visit Richard Steadman, the worldrenowned knee surgeon, in the latest bid to cure the England midfield player of the persistent tendinitis that is threatening his career. Hargreaves has made only 25 starts since he joined United in a projected £20.2 million deal from Bayern Munich 17 months ago.

A course of injections has done nothing to free Hargreaves of an injury that, in April, he claimed he might never be rid of, and, after visits to specialists in Sweden and London over the past ten days failed to provide any fresh answers, United decided to send the 27-year-old to Colorado to see Dr Steadman as fears grow for his future at Old Trafford.

“We have been trying to manage the situation, but we haven't been able to come up with an answer,” Sir Alex Ferguson, the United manager, said. “Owen has been frustrated and patient, but we have never really got to the bottom of his problem. We need to speed that up now, which is why we have sent him to the best available people in order to get a general opinion about where we go from here.”

Hargreaves is not the first United player to have visited Steadman. The Texan helped to save the careers of Roy Keane and Ruud van Nistelrooy, and more recently operated on Park Ji Sung, but, while the nature of Hargreaves's problem is not typical of the injuries that he normally deals with, Ferguson is hopeful that the surgeon's expertise will provide clues about what can be done, with surgery a distinct option.

There was better news regarding Paul Scholes, who has started light training after suffering knee ligament damage during the Champions League victory away to Aalborg 5½ weeks ago. Ferguson is hopeful that the midfield player will be available for the Barclays Premier League game away to Tottenham Hotspur on December 13 and the subsequent trip to Japan for the Fifa Club World Cup.

Wes Brown, the defender, has been ruled out for another two weeks with a sprained ankle, while Darren Fletcher, the midfield player, will miss the league game away to Arsenal this lunchtime with a knee injury.

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