Paul McShane admitted today he thought his Albion career was over.

The on-loan Manchester United centre half expected to be ruled out for the rest of the season after injuring his left ankle at Cardiff last month.

McShane revealed in The Argus on Tuesday that he should be fit for the key visit to Withdean of the Seagulls' fellow Championship strugglers Hull a week tomorrow.

It is a remarkable turnaround from the incident at Ninian Park 16 days ago which threatened to wreck his plans and reduced him to tears of frustration in the dressing room.

McShane was hurt in the first half in an aerial challenge with Cardiff striker Cameron Jerome.

"I won the header but was reaching for it, very close to him (Jerome), and my left foot got caught on his leg and kicked me off balance," he said.

"I knew straight away it was bad. I always hop off and try to run it off when something like that happens and I tried my best to come back on for a few minutes.

"When I took my sock off my ankle was like a balloon. I was devastated."

It wasn't only McShane who feared the worst. A grim diagnosis of ligament damage left Albion manager Mark McGhee believing the Republic of Ireland international would not be fit before his loan expired on December 31.

McShane returned to Old Trafford for treatment and a scan showed the injury was not as serious as originally suspected.

"I was expecting the worst," he said. "I thought I could be out for the whole season and I'd prepared myself for that.

"I went for the scan and, thank God, it was okay. I've sprained my ligaments and it showed some damage from a previous injury where I've gone over on the ankle before.

"It's really good now and this is just a slight setback. I've been playing first team games for Brighton and I'm loving every minute of it."

McShane is staying in Manchester to continue the recovery process before rejoining Albion.

The Seagulls have three matches in six days over Christmas after Hull's visit before his loan his up.

He is hoping United boss Alex Ferguson will allow him to stay then for the rest of the season, beginning with the trip to Southampton on January 2.

If his wish is granted McShane will probably miss a couple more matches at some stage through suspension. He has been booked seven times, three short of another ban.

Albion's disciplinary record this season is pretty good but bans are bound to start eating into their bid for Championship survival.

Paul Reid collected his fourth caution at Watford last Saturday. One more and the versatile Australian will have to sit out a match.

That will be an unusual experience for Reid. He has started each of Albion's last 40 games in the Championship, stretching back to the victory at Sheffield United at the beginning of the year.

Dean Hammond, Colin Kazim-Richards, Leon Knight, Gary Hart, Jake Robinson and Alexis Nicolas are all on three bookings and the cut-off point for the punishment reducing from a suspension to a warning is not until February