Un-Apeness

[Johnny Dalmas]

Really tough break for Apeness.
...

I'm really starting to have doubts in our trainer/medical team's ability to handle soft tissue injuries.
Griffin turned out ok after a long long rehab (his performance aside).
But Morabito, Bennell, Clarke and now Apeness seem to keep suffering setbacks.
Is it really just their body, or is it the management of the injury?

Well Morabito, Clarke, and Apeness have mostly had structural knee issues. I don't know if the trainers and medicos can be blamed if a player does a knee ligament or cracks his kneecap.

Bennell on the other hand? I'm not an expert but I wonder if we train him too much. Perhaps he is a player that will always get injured under a high training load. Perhaps these persistent problems didn't reveal themselves at Gold Coast because he was never required to train as hard as he has at Freo. Perhaps we should try playing him off a reduced training load and see how far his natural talent can take him.

 

[Kram]

So pissed about this injury.

 

[Belnakor]

I'm really starting to have doubts in our trainer/medical team's ability to handle soft tissue injuries.
Griffin turned out ok after a long long rehab (his performance aside).
But Morabito, Bennell, Clarke and now Apeness seem to keep suffering setbacks.
Is it really just their body, or is it the management of the injury?

we drafted a guy much higher than other teams rated him and who we knew had knee issues and had done his ACL when he was younger, hadn't played alot of AFL games either.

You can chalk that up to the recruiters.

Clarke has only himself to blame, damaged his knee when he was off his chops at a music concert and basically killed his AFL career. He was looking really good too before that.

 

[holy diver]

we drafted a guy much higher than other teams rated him and who we knew had knee issues and had done his ACL when he was younger, hadn't played alot of AFL games either.

You can chalk that up to the recruiters.

Clarke has only himself to blame, damaged his knee when he was off his chops at a music concert and basically killed his AFL career. He was looking really good too before that.

I don't even doubt that anymore. I really hope the club has learned from these drafting mistakes although I can understand Freo's quiet desperation trying to bring in quality talls as KPP's.

 

[yoong]

Well Morabito, Clarke, and Apeness have mostly had structural knee issues. I don't know if the trainers and medicos can be blamed if a player does a knee ligament or cracks his kneecap.

Bennell on the other hand? I'm not an expert but I wonder if we train him too much. Perhaps he is a player that will always get injured under a high training load. Perhaps these persistent problems didn't reveal themselves at Gold Coast because he was never required to train as hard as he has at Freo. Perhaps we should try playing him off a reduced training load and see how far his natural talent can take him.

I'm not an expert as well. I do have my run-ins with soft tissue injury and do a lot of reading as a result.
IIRC, Morabito elected to do LARs for his 3rd knee surgery and it actually held up. What didn't hold up was his hammy.
Similarly for Bennell, the latest injury is to his "good" calf, not the one he had chronic problems with.
Now, Apeness PCL injury is to his other "good" knee...

Part of rehabilitation is strengthening and improving the range of motion for the injured joint/tissue.
My question is more like, are the medicals doing the appropriate analysis and strengthening ALL the related muscle group, not just the injured one.
What I really couldn't convince myself is how Bennell can injure his "good" calf when so much attention is already on his calf injuries. Seriously, i don't believe the medico will go "oh, lets just strengthen his 'injured' calf and ignore the good one." It's well known there is a tendency for the body to over compensate and overload the opposite joint when a joint suffer serious injury. So equal attention should be placed on those areas and other related muscle groups when they are doing strengthening/conditioning? If they are doing all the appropriate strengthening on both Bennell's calves, how did he manage to injury his 'good' calf?
Ditto the question for Apeness.
And for Morabito.

I don't want to think that our medical staff is no good. Every club have injuries to their players. And Soft tissue injuries are notoriously hard to fix.
But I'm telling myself I'll know for sure if I heard some like "after fixing his 2 injured calves, Bennell suffered a 'new' injury to his hamstring" or something to that effect.
Fingers crossed I'm wrong.

 

[salim malik]

I heard an interview with the Claremont coach re Mora. He said Mora was on a light training regime that is not up to an AFL clubs standard. He probably will never be fit enough to play AFL. WAFL now seems to be his limit.

 

[couldhavebeen]

Moro Knee won't ever be able to attain AFL level of fitness , Apeness is quickly heading in the same direction I'm afraid . Bennell could be in the same position but his mate Matera at Gold Coast recons that he will be ready to play before the season is done .Gee's I hope so . 2 years to get his calf right is a bloody long time . TBH if they can't get him on the park by years end then he has to go .Clark's working hard to get out of the rehab group but again if its not right by seasons end its been nice to know ya Clarkey.

 

[Silent Alarm]

we drafted a guy much higher than other teams rated him and who we knew had knee issues and had done his ACL when he was younger, hadn't played alot of AFL games either.

You can chalk that up to the recruiters.

Clarke has only himself to blame, damaged his knee when he was off his chops at a music concert and basically killed his AFL career. He was looking really good too before that.

Meh I don't mind it, sometimes the club takes weird risks (ie inconsistent mid-sized half forwards, 6'1 midfielders with no redeeming qualities) but this was a good one, I don't mind it. Freo were screaming out for a full forward and a big guy who already had that man-child mass across the shoulders and core, who had gone well in the TAC Cup, and with Pav a few years from retirement was a gamble I can respect. Doing an ACL that young will probably end up being a lesson for a heap of clubs but the guy has some mongrel and a simple, straight-forward confidence I like.

Clarke was s**t. Never gave two *s about games. The amount of times he'd jog to a contest for the taking that was three metres in front was appalling, even in cut throat finals. That game down in Geelong years ago saw a lot of guys play out of their skin but he was one of the few I was angry at.

 

[meima]

Zac Clarke is such a waste of time and money.

 

[FUS_RO_DAH]

Zac Clarke is such a waste of time and money.

I honestly keep forgetting he's on the list

 

[Carl Hooper]

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