Jermain Defoe's pelvic injury is being combatted by the controversial blood-spinning method, Tottenham Hotspur manager André Villas-Boas revealed.
Blood-spinning entails small samples of an athlete's blood being withdrawn and then spun in a centrifuge to increase the concentration of growth hormones. The sample is then injected back into the athlete in a bid to quicken their recovery, with the healing process estimated to be five times faster.
Defoe, currently Tottenham's only out-and-out first-team striker, missed their weekend FA Cup defeat at Leeds United due to the injury.
"We believe in the treatment Jermain has been having and there is no danger that he will make the injury worse by what we have done," insisted Villas-Boas ahead of tonight's match at Norwich City. "It is a technique that we have been using since the beginning of the season. It is not common but does happen from club to club.
Defoe could return against Norwich tonight
"You take out the blood from any part of the body and spin it around. The plasma comes to the top of the blood and you are able to inject it back into the body and that is the part of the blood that heals injuries. It accelerates the recovery process.
"Jermain had an scan and it was not too bad, so we decide that the injection was the right course of action. He will be with us at Norwich, so this is extremely important news for us."
Although legal, José Mourinho's Chelsea were warned about employing the method by the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) in 2005 on Dutch winger Arjen Robben.
Dick Pound, the former president of WADA, said "it sounds like blood manipulation of some sort to me" at the time.