Sometimes the blame for our injuries is laid at the feet of Arsenal's medical team. In my opinion, this is unfair. They do everything in their power to ensure that our players receive the best medical care, nutrition, training methods, rehabilitation - going much further than many clubs in ensuring that the players needs are met, that preventative measures are in place and that Arsenal are at the forefront of cutting edge technology to maintain fitness and prevent injuries. There's an interesting in depth article which highlights some of the methods used, some notable points are that for Champions League matches 'Arsenal are well below the average for muscle strains, training injuries and severe injuries'. Also reported was that 'last year was an awful year for injuries and that there were 7 fractures. Generally, there would be 1-3 fractures.' So it seems that we have had more than our fair share of bad luck with injuries. Aside from injuries that are out of the medical team's control, their methods are making an impact into preventing recurring injuries as 'There were also LESS recurring injuries this year', which indicates that the medical team's methods have a positive impact on reducing the niggling injuries that some players carry. http://www.arsenalinsider.com/3626/exclusive-wengers-bid-to-ease-arsenal-injuries-revealed/
Well i blame the physio's. We get more niggling injuries than any other side, and they always become serious. See Jack Wilshere as an example.
I wouldn't blame the medical team for the injuries players sustain. But i do have issues with apparent mis-managment of injuries how many times does 3 weeks out suddenly turn into 6 weeks then 3 months then bang gone for the year. Rosicky TV and Wilshere are examples. Then the smaller cases of Diaby and others. The number of injuries we sustain would likely have to do with training, techniques style of play which has less to do with them - but the short (which become long ) term injuries I have real issue with.
These types of injuries are frustrating - but I'm not sure that our medical team can do anything else about it. If a player is out for 3 months, he's out for three months and can't be rushed back after 6 weeks. I'd don't know if it's mis-management, the professionalism of the medical team would suggest it isn't. Maybe sometimes things just take longer than expected. But I do admit, it does seem to happen on a regular basis.
Many injuries are a result of very late passing tippy-tappy inviting the opponents to lunge in late. This twisting,turning style causes greater risk of strain or simple fouls that do damage as there is no direct tackle.
I agree, the Horse Placenta story was a little worrying - at least he didn't go and see Eileen Drury for help with it I suppose....
I'd like to see us play more direct football too I think we're missing Fabreags' ability to find a defence splitting pass...
It's highly worrying and while I'm sure the medical team is doing everything possible, it's the root cause that perhaps should be looked into with greater scrutiny. By that I mean our style of play. My memory may well be fading but I do not recall such a spate of injuries in any past era.
Piskie - you say you don't want battles or WUMS on this site and yet you jump in completely fabricating what I said. Where did I mention hoofing - in fact if you had paid attention yesterday - I said exactly the opposite talking about more direct football. You are one of the worst contradictory offenders IMO. stand by for deletion readers......
Berg - I think you are so right on this, but allow me to elaborate. Part of our problem over the 2-3 years or so is that our passing game is not actually very accurate. Far too often a pass is played to a player recovering his position or under pressure. Far too often when passing forward the pass is either just that little bit behind or ahead causing the receiving player to break step or stretch, and a lot of these careless passes invite lunging tackles. Add to this also that our passes are often predictable, our play ponderous or over elaborate. In short, I beleive if our players passed the ball better, timed their runs better and knocked the stuffing out of teams by banging in a few early goals instead of giving their opponents a glimmer of hope with which to fight for a point or 3 then we'd have easier wins and less frantic games.
When we get it right, you can see that we move the ball really quickly and our passing is swift and decisive. But when it doesn't come off, we do end up inviting dangerous tackles. That said, it's up to the oppo player not to simply dive in when there's no chance of winning the ball.
the main trouble is- refs are not inclined to 'protect' us much. So damage is done before bookings begin to stop it.
I think we suffered for a long time from teams' strategy that the only way to deal with us was to 'get in their faces' and 'kick them' - totally unacceptable in my opinion, Wenger called for better protection for years from referees and he was slated as being a 'whinger' only when we suffered several horrific leg breaks and fractures did refs finally begin to wake up to what Wenger was saying.
looks to be working out finally - look at RvP!! Rosicky was a special case - the same injury stopped his brother or cousin's career totally so he did well to come back at all. Vermaelen was another weird one, something ligament or something that he had that most people don't have, so it took a while to realise what it was. Not sure on the others.
Not to play devils advocate but do you think wenger purposefully misleads the media and fans on length of injuries to star players - TV RVP WILSHERE Rosicky (at the time) while his more accurate with the lesser players because he fears a backlash of signing a player to cover for a 1 year injury rather than a "3 week one". Or even more Dick Dastardly the board tells the medical team to lie to wenger so he doesn't spend any money??? I can just imagine Hill-Wood please log in to view this image
