I find it highly unlikely that a football player would prefer to make permanent rehab exercices under the supervision of a physio (hard, painful and boring), rather than playing football with his team-mates. It surely can be hard as well, but it’s still an exciting game, under the limelight of supporters and media.
Who would prefer the former to the latter? I know which one I’d chose.
@Semmy , I was looking at this point.
Glad to be corrected. Maybe it’s the after tax salary being mentioned here.
no longer our problem…
tell me you’ve played before. please.
If I were getting paid 2.5mil/yr to kick a ball around, absolutely I would if my legs were falling off
however, some guys think differently than we do. I had a guest at my home 10 years go who played in Europe from 18 to 27. he literally “got tired of it” and moved home because he wasn’t enjoying playing anymore. But he did say he’d have stuck it out if the money was worth it, but he really didn’t enjoy the game. Suspect Naby and guys like Rendon are similar. Have the talent not the drive.
If you look at his injury history, he was getting similar injuries at Leipzig. Just less serious, healed faster. With 20/20 hindsight, I think there is a laziness problem there, but perhaps not the one you think. Even his first season at LFC wasn’t terrible, two significant spells, and then the one to end the season. At that point, he was 24. That is right about the age where you really aren’t a kid anymore. Approaching the peak of strength for males, but with consequences.
You have to start being more of a professional at that stage, putting in the work to stay in peak condition. It never really sounded like he was doing that, instead hoping he would heal up, get better, and it would all go back to the way it was when he was 21. It just didn’t, it wasn’t going to, and he never adapted. Instead, it just got worse.
At this point, I think he is close to done. Headed toward 29, probably has a body similar to Sturridge, and doesn’t have the work ethic to keep it on the pitch. Reconditioning completely from the litany of guarding and similar injuries he has taken around his legs will take time he no longer has.
Still struggling to understand what the hell Werder were thinking. They don’t have the finances for such a high risk player, without checking I would assume he’s one of their highest paid players, if not the highest. Oh well, their problem…
could be. I’ve been playing around the community of guys since we were kids. We have one player on my over-40’s team now, that I was playing with at 17. He still does 5k every night and in his mid-40’s can still outplay most 25yo’s. He’s just built different.
Just built different, but if he is doing 5k a night, he is also putting in the work. Presumably does regular stretching and so forth as well. Some players are built different in the opposite way, Sturridge was an example. Once his adult body had taken shape, he was just seriously imbalanced and therefore injury prone.
I played for years with a guy who could be relied upon to blow out one of his calf muscles every season. Still play with him, but he is practically immobile now. He was blazing fast when he was young, despite being fairly stocky, and never got injured until he was 24. By the time he was in his 30’s it was like clockwork. By the time he was in his 40’s, he simply did not sprint any more, because he could not take more than 3-4 steps without his calf blowing out. As an amateur athlete, he just wasn’t putting in the work in his late 20’s to get off that pathway, but now in hindsight he regrets that. I suspect that is Keita’s trajectory now.
You often wonder if these people actually have any knowledge of football.
agreed. it makes you wonder. he wouldn’t be high on my risk/reward scale, that’s for sure.
Harsh
You don’t believe in coincidences = Keita is a lazy cunt.
I can’t believe we actually put a renewal offer on the table. Best rejection ever.
Yeah, I can accept this argument. It’s strange though that the coaching team and the medics didn’t act to avoid that, and they even renewed his contract at a point when he was getting serious injuries all the time, didn’t they?
@Semmy , yeah I’ve played before, but not at a professional level. My preferred position was right back (some coaches I had thought they had to play me as a CB because of my height, but I hated that position to be fair).
Unless you are Naby Keita you really cannot make an informed comment on his state of mind.
It’s grossly unfair to conflate constant injury with laziness, of any sort.
Some players are dogged by injuries and can never get to full fitness. Its physical rather than mental in a lot of cases.
Richie Sadlier could have had a decent professional career, but was cut short with injury.
He is never accused, and rightly never accused of laziness. He is considered unlucky.
Naby was a big money, high profile purchase that much was expected of.
Dissapointment in his career progression turned to nasty jibes and judgement based a belief that he was stealing a living.
Maybe he was or is lazy…or maybe he is a young man whose career and promise is let down by his body.
feel sorry for him…just glad he is someones elses problem now.
Sadlier was on his why to a very promising career from what i remember but had that bad injury while at Millwall at 21 i think???Most outside Ireland won’t remember him now but has made a good go at the punditry.
Sturridge was always accussed of being lazy/weak and didn’t get that much sympathy in the long run from our supporters.Is there any real difference between him and Kieta?
Sturridge and Keita got unfair comments in my view.
Both talented, both unfortunate.
Why would anyone consider sitting it out when they could be playing?
Either they were injured, or other stuff that we are unaware of is happening for them.
I just think charges of laziness is unjustified.
Ahem
Ok!!
I meant players!!
There are a lot of similarities, but Sturridge’s injuries were really quite localized around one muscle group. Could he have worked harder to remedy that? Perhaps, but it sounds like the problem was not diagnosed early enough. Keita’s injury problems were broader, albeit probably similarly rooted in one area with most others being guarding/compensating effects.