GLOUCESTER wing Jonny May hopes to be somewhere near his best by the end of the year after seeing his chances of playing for England in the Six Nations dashed by a knee injury last January.

The problem was severe enough for the 26-year-old to need surgery on his ligaments and since then he has been toughing it out and staying positive.

But on the horizon is the British and Irish Lions tour of New Zealand, the toughest Lions trip of them all, with the first match on June 3, 2017. If May wants to go, then he needs to prove himself at international level.

First and foremost is getting back to match fitness with Gloucester, but  he has a big ally in current England national coach Eddie Jones.

May, who was part of former England coach Stuart Lancaster’s World Cup squad last year, admitted it has been a long, hard slog to get back to around 90 per cent of full fitness at this point.

He said: “It has been very tough times over the last seven months but I can see the light at the end of the tunnel so I just have to keep working hard every day, be patient and I am looking forward to getting back out there at some point.

“I am starting to drop into rugby sessions now. Recently, I’ve done units with the backs and it is just about steady steps to keep exposing my knee and see how it copes with it.

“If you pass that hurdle, you go onto a bit more next week and build it up like that,”

Jones, who took over from Lancaster after the nation’s World Cup disaster, has enough faith in May to have named him in his Elite Player Squad (EPS) this month.

England play South Africa, Fiji, Argentina and Australia this November but it is highly unlikely that May will be anywhere near fit enough to face those countries.

So the Six Nations in the spring would be his only available international window to make a pitch for the Lions.

The 19-times capped winger and former Wootton Bassett RFC junior added: “To be fair, I just want to get healthy first. There is a big difference between playing and performing and I can’t expect to come back in after being out for seven or eight months and be in the form of my life!

“When I get back on the pitch, that is the last stage of my rehab, really. I just need to play week in and week out and, hopefully, by Christmas or however long it takes, I will be back to where I want to be."