Before I’m too relieved I want to clarify with @willie_■■■■ if a sprain is still potentially mismanagement.
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Our “don’t hyper extend your knee when you land” training clearly needs some work.
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Really happy that he’ll be ready for round 1, 2027. This was off the AFL website.
Meanwhile, the club has received some welcome news with Lewis Hayes not requiring surgery on his ACL.
There were fears the defender had ruptured his ACL for a second time, but scans on Thursday confirmed an ACL sprain.
While he will miss the remainder of the season, the Bombers expect him to be available for the start of pre-season training.
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Good news for next year…he still misses this year, but he should get some preseason.
We still need Key defender support though.
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ACL awareness
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He’ll miss this year, have a delyed pre season and surgery in Feb 2027, take it to the bank…its the Essington way
For those who know about these things (and there seem to be a few in here), what is a sprain?
For me, not knowing much, it seems a big deal that the grafted ligament held despite a significant jolt. It should give him some confidence that it will be ok.
So everytime he sprains this he will miss the year? How do you even sprain an acl?
Good to hear the news is less bad than thought.
Maybe our luck is changing?
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Dr AI says all ACL injuries are sprains. This must just me a mild grade 1 sprain as opposed to a grade 3 fully torn or ruptured one.
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So I’ve googled it too, and a “sprain” seems to be minor damage to the ACL involving some tearing. However, if the ACL can’t repair itself, as Dr. Google says, due to a lack of blood supply, how does a player recover? And, more importantly, is he susceptible to future further tearing, or even a full rupture, if the ligament is already damaged (partly torn) and can’t recover?
Your ACL is a ligament. Think of it like a thick tight elastic band holding 2 things together, in this case obviously his knee. In reality you could think of an ACL actually like 2 elastic bands, but in this particular case this wasn’t his ACL it was an ACL graft (most likely hamstring + adductor graft) so that doesn’t apply here.
That elastic band obviously has some amount of stretch that it can achieve without being damaged. But if you surpass a particular threshold of stretch due to speed and magnitude of force, that band can be damaged. But that damage can occur to varying degrees.
It can be:
- grade 3/rupture - completely ripped in 2.
- grade 2 sprain - Still in tact but with a significant disruption of the elastic fibres. Can be quite a variance here as to how much damage, band could be hanging on by a thread or could be 25%/50%/75% intact… likely to have a fairly significant effect on the functional performance of the elastic band and it’s ability to withstand future stretch events.
- grade 1 sprain - Minimal fibre disruption… maybe you see a little bit of fraying of said elastic band. Minimal effect on it’s ability to continue to function as an elastic band.
A different context also helps with understanding for some. We sprain (or rupture) our ankle ligaments all the time, and people grasp this easily. The ACL can be just the same as that.
Unlike the elastic band analogy above, that fibre disruption on the ACL can heal and restore its integrity over time, and regain strength, whereas the elastic band is permanently weakened.
But what is different to the ankle is the speed at which these ligaments heal, due to said
ankle ligaments all existing external to the joint, whereas the ACL is inside it. So healing is slow. Depending on the extent of the damage to said ACL graft, it restoring it’s integrity doesn’t necessarily mean it can or will restore to maximum capacity however.
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- Not necessarily. But hopefully he doesn’t do it again. As with all such injuries, he is a higher risk of doing so though. I have zero doubt that some players sustain a grade 1 sprain of their ACL, and even grade 2 probably at times, but are not aware of it and simply carry on with no ill effect.
- The exact same way you rupture them, but with slightly less force or slightly less speed
Time in a hyperbaric chamber might be the go. Maybe we need to buy one for the hanger?
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Thanks for that. Very informative. I guess my main interest in understanding it is to have an idea of what the future holds for Hayes, and how susceptible he is to future re-injury.
Footy clubs don’t buy things, they get donated by rich fans so it’s not in the cap space
Anyone who has done an ACL unfortunately has an increased risk of re-injury. This incident certainly wouldn’t help.
He’s missing too many weeks for a grade 1 o2 sprain / strain. Even after a reconstruction.