LONDON -- Guus Hiddink has confirmed that Radamel Falcao's latest injury is "very serious" and would not be drawn on whether the Colombian has already played his last game for Chelsea.
Falcao has not featured for the Blues since picking up what former boss Jose Mourinho described as "an important muscular injury" to his thigh in November, and suffered a recurrence of the problem shortly after Hiddink's arrival at Stamford Bridge last month.
Monaco vice-president Vadim Vasilyev confirmed on Thursday that the Ligue 1 club opted not to recall Falcao after flying him back to Stade Louis II last week for assessment, and prior to Chelsea's 2-2 draw with West Bromwich Albion on Wednesday Hiddink revealed that no timeframe has been set for the 29-year-old's recovery.
Falcao has made just 11 appearances in all competitions for Chelsea this season, scoring one goal, and Hiddink refused to speculate on whether the striker will be fit enough to take the field again before his loan ends.
"The medical staff and physical staff will bring him to me when he is recovered, and we haven't set a time on that," Hiddink said of Falcao. "We'll give him time to recover because he's always dropping back into physical problems. Normally I like to put a little pressure on [the medical staff] to have the player available, but in this case I'll step back and let them deliver a fit player to me."
Asked if Falcao has played his last game for Chelsea, Hiddink replied: "There are still many months to go, so that's too far. We're almost at the end of January, then February, normally six, seven, eight weeks with serious damage. It's very serious.
"It's a pity for him because he's very eager to come back. That's a bit of the problem -- he was so eager the previous time and wanted to prove himself maybe a little bit too much to me, and then he fell into this injury again.
"If you've been one of the star players in Europe scoring many, many goals and then you have these [injury problems] at the age in which you want to perform in your career, it must be very hard for him."
Despite Falcao's ongoing injury problems and reports linking Alexandre Pato, Saido Berahino, Jamie Vardy and Alex Teixeira with a move to Stamford Bridge this month, Hiddink insists he will not be urging Chelsea into any rushed transfer decisions in the winter window.
"You must be rather desperate if you bring in players in January," the Dutchman insisted. "Chelsea must look at today's situation and also the upcoming summer situation regarding signings, etc, etc. We must be careful not to do stupid things."