Are you an avid fan of football? Are you someone who is passionate about football or follows a professional path in this field?

Have you ever thought about the injuries a football player can have in their career?

Worry not, Mykare Health is here to help you understand about one of the most common injuries among football players: ACL injury, also known as Anterior Cruciate Ligament Tear.

In this blog we will discuss ACL injuries and how it affects football careers.

What is an ACL injury ?

An ACL also known as the anterior cruciate ligament is one of the main stabilising ligaments in the knee. It's a ligament that connects the thigh bone to the leg bone. An injury happening to this ligament is called an ACL injury

Causes

Your ACL controls the sudden movements your leg makes during athletic activities, especially football. ACL injuries typically occur when your leg movements are rapidly changing during athletic activities.

Football is known to have one of the highest ACL injury cases.

ACL can occur without contact as well, in this case the ligaments fail with the twisting mechanism and it usually happens among female athletes.

ACL injuries often happens during sports and fitness activities that can put strain on your knees such as:

• Cutting which means when you slow down during an activity and suddenly change the direction of your movement.

• Pivoting with your feet firmly planted.

• Landing awkwardly after a jump.

• Stopping Your Movement suddenly.

• Receiving a direct blow to your knee or a collision.

Symptoms Of ACL Surgery

• Pain

• Immediate difficulty with walking

• Sensation of knee instability

• Immediate swelling

• Popping sound at the time of injury

Seek immediate care if you are feeling any of these symptoms. The knee joint is a complex structure of bones, ligaments, tendons and other tissues that work together.

It's important to get a prompt and accurate diagnosis to determine the severity of the injury and get proper treatment.

Risk Factors for ACL Injuries

• Females are prone to have higher probability of getting ACL injuries due to differences in anatomy, muscle strength and hormonal influences.

• Participating in certain sports, such as soccer, football, basketball, gymnastics etc.

• Poor conditioning

• Using faulty movement patterns

• Wearing footwear that doesn't fit properly

• Using poorly maintained sports equipment

• Playing on artificial turf

These are some of the risk factors that can cause an ACL injury. You should be cautious when doing sports or any fitness activities.

Treatment for ACL Injury

• ACL injuries have poor blood supply, which in turn limit the healing ability of the ligament.

• Diagnosis is done by orthopaedic sports medicine physician often supplemented with X-rays and MRI scans

• Treatment depends on each individual. While some need surgery for your ACL tear others only need non surgical methods such as bracing and rehabilitation.

• The surgery involves using a graft from another tendon to substitute for the torn ACL.

• Non-operative treatment may lead to recurrent knee instability and potential damage to joint surfaces and cartilage.

• Rehabilitation after surgery focuses on restoring range of motion, protecting the surgical site, and minimising muscle atrophy.

• Patients may initially use a brace and crutches, progressing to strengthening exercises and sport-specific training

• Return to sports typically occurs between 7 to 9 months post-surgery.

When patients choose non-operative treatment, the most common complication is the knees instability. This means that the knee is not reliable, may give out during sports, and has the small risk of causing increasing damage to the joint surface and cartilage.

Rehabilitation after surgery will focus on restoring the range of motion, protecting the surgery, and minimising muscle atrophy.

Typically, a brace and protected weight-bearing crutches are utilised for several weeks. You will then progress to strengthening exercises and more sport-specific training.

Most patients are allowed to return to sports between 7 to 9 months, however, the use of a brace when returning to sports is individualised. There is no scientific evidence that braces prevent ACL injury.

Complications

People who have experienced ACL tears have a higher chance of developing osteoarthritis in the knees which is a degenerative joint disease, in which the tissues in the joint break down over time.

Joint Inflammation also known as arthritis can also happen even after the surgery because Arthritis occurs depending upon severity of the original injury, the presence of related injuries in the knee joint or the level of activity after treatment.

Prevention

Proper training and exercise are the best way to prevent your ACL injury.

Your sports medicine physician, physical therapist, athletic trainer or other specialist in sports medicine can provide assessment, instruction and feedback that can help you reduce risks.

• Exercise to strengthen your core such as your pelvis and lower abdomen.

• Exercise your leg muscles so that you can gain an overall balance in leg muscle strength.

• Training and exercise emphasising proper technique and knee position when jumping and landing from jumps

• Training to improve technique when performing pivoting and cutting movements

Training to strengthen muscles of the legs, hips and core as well as training to improve jumping and landing techniques and to prevent inward movement of the knee may help to reduce the higher ACL injury risk in female athletes.

Will An ACL Injury End Your Football Career?

It is a common misconception that if you tear your ACL, it means your career is over. In most cases it is not true.

This misconception is farther from the truth

There are several football players such as Alan Shearer, Ruud van Nistelrooy and Xavi returning back to the field much stronger after their ACL injury recovery.

There are a lot more athletes who have gone back to their productive career after recovering.

About 3/4 of athletes that have an ACL injury, are able to return to their previous level of play which shows us that the statistics of players returning to their career is higher than the opposite.

Only in extreme scenarios where the injury is too severe to heal properly does athletes have to say bye to their career.

ACL tear is an injury that happens to the ligament in your legs often during sports or fitness activities. You may be concerned about ending your career in football because of your ACL injury, but it is far from the truth.

There are several athletes who came back to their former glory after recovering from their ACL injury.

Training to strengthen muscles of the legs, hips and core as well as training to improve jumping and landing techniques and to prevent inward movement of the knee may help to reduce the higher ACL injury risk.