Prostejov, Czech Republic: Two-time Wimbledon tennis champion Petra Kvitova faces around six months out of the sport while her playing hand, wounded in a knife attack, recovers its strength, the surgeon who operated on her said Wednesday.

Kvitova was injured on Tuesday when she fought off an intruder in her apartment in the Czech Republic.

“When we talk about [competitive] pressure on the hand, we are talking about a period of around six months [before that is possible],” Radek Kebrle said in a televised news conference.

“She is a young athlete, healthy ... but it still is a relatively massive injury,” he said, adding that all the fingers on Kvitova’s left hand were hurt as she grabbed the attacker’s knife.

Her spokesman, Karel Tejkal, earlier described Tuesday’s near four-hour operation as a success and said Kvitova’s mood was optimistic.

But both he and the Women’s Tennis Association suggested her future in the sport was uncertain. “There will be several weeks of waiting with a splint and then, gradually, slowly she will be able to put the hand to work,” Tejkal told Czech public television. But any return to competitive tennis for the Czech world number 11 was “weeks and months” away, he said. “It’s unclear if or when Kvitova will be back on the court, and the start of 2017 won’t be the same without her unique power and competitive spirit,” the WTA said on its website.

Wimbledon win

Aged 26, the hard-hitting left-hander rose to world number two in 2011 when she won the first of her two Wimbledon singles titles, and has been a mainstay of the top ten virtually ever since.

Czech police were still searching for her attacker, a man who is about 35 years old, public television reported.

The operation, which took three hours and 45 minutes on Tuesday, revealed that Kvitova’s left-hand was seriously injured. But her spokesman Karel Tejkal lately confirmed that “there’s no reason to think she wouldn’t be able to play tennis.”

Kvitova is expected to miss the Australian Open and the Duty Free Dubai Open.

The 2011 and 2014 champion at the All England Club said she felt lucky to have survived the attack, which Tejkal described as random crime.

“In my attempt to defend myself, I was badly injured on my left hand. I am shaken, but fortunate to be alive,” Kvitova wrote on Twitter.