Falcao to fight to bitter end to make World Cup

Lisbon: Colombian international striker Radamel Falcao said on Monday he would do everything in his power to recover from his serious knee injury in time for the World Cup finals in June.

The 27-year-old -- who has yet to appear at world football`s showpiece tournament -- ruptured the anterior cruciate ligament in his left knee during his side Monaco`s 3-0 win in the French Cup over amateur side Chasselay last Wednesday. However, Falcao, who underwent an operation on Saturday in Oporto, Portugal, said he would draw on the slight hope he had been given by the surgeon that he would be fit for the finals in Brazil. "They told me there was a slim chance of me being fit for the World Cup finals and I am going to cling to that hope," he said at a press conference in the city where he first made his name in European football for Porto. "I am convinced that everything will go well. "I feel that I will have to expend all my energy every day to be fit." Falcao, who played for Porto from 2009-11 before moving to Spanish outfit Atletico Madrid and then a big money move to Ligue 1 title contenders Monaco at the start of this season, will undergo three weeks of rehabilitation treatment at his former club and will also pursue a course of treatment in a hyperbaric chamber. Falcao`s importance to Colombia -- who are drawn in Group C at the World Cup with Ivory Coast, Greece and Japan -- is impossible to over-estimate as he scored a third of their 27 qualifying goals.