"I'm back in training, running and it feels much better now," Richards told the Spurs official website.
"I had some treatment in Germany and I'm hoping that's done the trick because the worst-case scenario if it hadn't started healing was surgery and that would have been a minimum of 12 weeks out.
"So I'm hoping the treatment has worked and as I said, it feels much better.
"It's a problem that has bugged for a a long time now. I had problems at Southampton, even last season, but it's something I've been able to deal with and hopefully that will be the case again this season."