Jo's injury update - stage 1!

On the 19th of November 2023 something I never dreamt of happening happened to me. I was playing a football game for my team Nantwich Town Women. It was a pretty important match, cup game against a local rival team Congleton Town. The day started normal like every Sunday during the season, I got up early had a good breakfast. Started to get myself prepped for the game; made sure my bag was packed, I had all my fluids, half time fuel (apple & cereal bar). On big game days I always try to put a motivational message in our group chat. This day was no different, I had such a good feeling that today was the day we were going to finally beat this team. My parents were up from Brighton visiting, they hadn’t watched me play football in about 4/5 years. We waited for them to come to my house and then we left about 12pm. I arrived at Congleton High School about 12:35pm and went straight into the changing rooms, the girls got the music on the speakers, and everything was like it always is. Everyone happy, pumped for the game and ready to go kick some ass on the pitch.
 
We went out to the 3G pitch about 1:20pm, did our usual warm up which I had implemented at the start of the season with the hope of reducing injuries in the team. On a side note, I thoroughly believe this has worked for the best part, and my injury, which I will explain in due course, was not a result of a poor warm up. My partner had taken my parents to the shop to grab lunch and I saw them coming into the stands just as we were lining up to kick off.
 
The game started competitively as it always does against this team, a few solid challenges flying in. A couple of scoring opportunities for us early on and then it all went horribly wrong for me. I play at centre back and I am an important part of how our defence works/plays. The opposition had a throw in just outside of our 18-yard box, their target was the no.9 who I was responsible for marking. As the ball was thrown in, I got myself in between her and the ball as you should and volleyed the ball away with my left foot. The details of what happened next are a little hazy as it happened very quickly from what I can recall. The main things I can remember are as I went to put my foot back down on the floor the no.9 who had committed to the challenge as well unfortunately mis-timed her attempt and kicked the back of my left calf. As a result, I believe the force of that, my body weight, her body weight, and the type of pitch we were playing on all contributed to me getting injured. I felt a very warm uncomfortable feeling in my left knee as my foot hit the floor again. I didn’t hear or feel the famous pop many people speak about and I honestly at that point wasn’t in a lot of pain.
 
I can’t describe fully why I did this, but I instantly went into professional mode and in my head started to analyse very quickly what had just happened and what was likely going on inside my knee. I’m the sort of player on the pitch who doesn’t go down easily, and I rarely stay down. I think my team knew something wasn’t right very quickly when I didn’t get back up. My manager, one of the other players who is a physio, a couple of my close friends and about 1 minute later my partner all were around me to see what was wrong. All I remember saying was “my knee has gone, she kicked the back of my leg, you need to get me off the pitch”. My partner and manager both looked concerned, I would never ask to be taken off the pitch unless it was serious. We took our time but eventually with some help I hopped off and sat down against the fence. Typically, it then began to rain, when I felt up to it, we moved me into the stands where my parents were watching on. I asked for ice out of the physio bag and for something to put under my knee so I could get it elevated. As we started to tape a couple of ice packs around my knee, I moved my lower leg slightly forward and felt a very big pop on the outside of my knee. For a split second my knee felt great, but it didn’t last the pain that followed was indescribable, I felt hot, sweaty, sick, faint and obviously in pain with my left knee. 


I’ve been told I went white as a ghost, I felt so weak that I needed to lean on my mum to stay upright and my girlfriend instantly called 999. The operator wanted to talk to me, but I really didn’t feel up to it. I don’t remember much of the conversation, but I do remember it was nearly a 6 hour wait for an ambulance. By this time, I had taken some paracetamol, had most of a sugary drink and was feeling more myself again. We got the car as close to me as possible and with the help of a couple of our supporters, I was carried to the car. Off we went to Leighton Hospital but not before the whole team came to say goodbye as the first half had finished and we were winning 2-0. I obviously told every one of them they needed to win the game for me, no pressure…
 
We drove to Leighton and went into A&E and controversially I am going to massively sing their praises. We were there no longer that about 2 and a half hours, we were shown straight to minors triage which was empty and within minutes I was taken through to see a nurse. My knee was assessed after I had explained what had happened, and I was told to go for an X-ray. After my partner nearly ran the wheelchair left leg first into the wall!! We waited for about 15 minutes for the x-ray and then I was heading back to the minors area. Once the x-ray had been assessed, the nurse came back in and explained they believed there may be some cartilage(meniscus) damage and
they were also concerned that the pop I felt on the outside of my knee was the relocation of the small bone on that side of my lower leg the fibula. As a result of these findings, I was put in a very uncomfortable brace called a cricket splint and sent on my way with crutches and told to await a phone call from the fracture clinic for a follow up appointment.
 
By now my knee was pretty swollen and I was very uncomfortable, so we detoured to Co-op on the way home for a bag of peas and some sweets and ordered a Chinese to make me feel better! Getting around my house, having a shower, and getting comfortable proved difficult to start with but I soon got the hang of it all. That night I told everyone at Maximise what had happened and that unfortunately I wouldn’t be able to work for the foreseeable.
 
 
It’s fair to say the events of this day has made my parents second guess if they ever want to watch me play football again but it certainly hasn’t changed my mind on the sport. I will return better and stronger it is still a massive part of my life, and it won’t deter me from playing.