With the Manchester City captain suffering an injury-hit season and facing a summer of rehabilitation, Goal has turned to a bio mechanics expert to shed some light on his struggles.
With the Manchester City captain suffering an injury-hit season and facing a summer of rehabilitation, Goal has turned to a bio mechanics expert to shed some light on his struggles.
With seemingly no end to Vincent Kompany's injury woes, fans of Manchester City and Belgium alike may be concerned about his long-term future in the game.
Kompany has battled back from 14 separate calf injuries during his time at City but is now sidelined for four months after undergoing surgery on a ruptured thigh muscle.
He has missed 31 City matches through injury this season and on three occasions he has picked up an injury within 10 minutes of setting foot on the pitch.
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But the noises coming out of Belgium suggest there is light at the end of the tunnel once again. Red Devils team doctor Lieven Maesschalck says he could play for another five years, as "this is a bio-mechanical thing to sort out."
But what does that mean? To get a better understanding of why Kompany is so beset by injuries, and what his latest recovery may entail, Goal spoke to Professor Gareth Irwin of Cardiff Metropolitan University.
Professor Irwin is the president of the International Society of Biometrics in Sport, has worked with the International Rugby Board, International Gymnastics and, for the last several years, has played an influential role in FIFA's research into injury and performance on artificial 3G pitches.
This, then, is the inside track on Kompany's struggles and his latest road to recovery...
"It’s his technique of running, or his technique of cutting [suddenly changing direction], or his technique of kicking," Professor Irwin tells Goal. "So it could be the technique he employs to do the skills to be successful. During those techniques he’s exposing his joints and his muscles to forces that his body can’t cope with.
"There’s reason to think that there might be issues, issues such as things like asymmetry of movement, imbalance between strength on the left and right side of the body and how that influences the load that his muscles and joints experience. If he’s not physically prepared to deal with those forces, potentially he’s going to get injured again."
On the three occasions Kompany has has been forced off the pitch early this season - against Sunderland in the league and Dynamo Kiev and Real Madrid in the Champions League - his injuries seem to have occurred as a result of a sudden change of direction or through over-stretching.
Kompany has posted video diaries of his extensive rehabilitation work this season, and Professor Irwin says the defender will have had to have been very careful with the specific type of training he puts himself through.
"We all have a natural, genetically pre-disposed level of asymmetry, we all have a favored limb so we’re always going to be slightly stronger on one side - it’s very rare to find an athlete that’s completely balanced.
"But if there’s enough imbalance, and certainly having an injury where you focus on the injured limb to rehabilitate it and neglect to strengthen at the same time the other limb, then an imbalance can occur. That imbalance is different to your natural level of asymmetry, so then an injury will potentially occur.
"You’re working and operating in an environment when there are forces that are going through your muscles and joints that are exposing your body to potentially hazardous levels."
City's highly experienced and incredibly well-funded team of medical experts have left no stone unturned in a bid to end Kompany's struggles, and the City captain has even changed his boot supplier and rolled his socks down his calves. Still, though, the 30-year-old ruptured his thigh against Real Madrid.
As Kompany starts to road to recovery yet again, Professor Irwin highlights the importance of compiling and adhering to an individually tailored bio-mechanical analysis.
"It’s kind of the stuff that I’ve done with elite athletes, sprinters. We’ve done some stuff with footballers as well. It’s a long-term strategy of working with a physio or strength conditioning coach to identify whether there are dysfunctions in specific skills, like running or walking.
"Are there imbalances in muscle strength on one side to another, and how do they change over a season? A good example would be how we did a lot of work in the build-up to the Olympics in 2004 with some of the GB sprinters. We had 6-12 months of data on one of the sprinters, who subsequently got injured, and we were able to use that information to rehabilitate him, whereas with Vincent he may not have that catalog of what technique he runs with and what forces he normally experiences and how he uses that to make his rehabilitation more effective."
| HOW WOULD IT APPLY TO KOMPANY? |
On the night of his set back against Kiev back in March, Kompany had told City's match day program that he had not had time to get himself fit in reserve matches due to the Blues' busy schedule in the Premier League and Champions League.
Now, with a full summer to recover and City likely to pursue alternative center backs, he may have the required time to fully incorporate a bio-mechanical rehabilitation program and ensure he does not break down in future.
Professor Irwin adds: "You would take four of five key skills that he would need: running and cutting, running and turning, and looking at what his techniques of those movements are. And then take some more traditional stuff, like how much force can he produce, turning force at the knee, what’s his left and right quad and hamstring balance like, and how consistent that is, looking at the medical records to see the frequency and the types of injuries are, and try to build up a picture of him. Do it at a bespoke, individual level.
"If I was his physio then I would be looking at identifying not a traditional functional movement screen – which is what a lot of Premier League players would do – but more of a bespoke analysis of his bio-mechanical characteristics of running, his cutting movements, sports-specific movements, because ultimately that’s when he’s getting injured.
"It might be that you say, ‘Ok, he’s match fit now because he’s got the same level of strength in his left thigh as he does in his right thigh,’ but when he does a cutting maneuvers, or a turning movement or when he sprints flat out or accelerates, those sort of activities may expose him to forces that his body just can’t cope with.
"The physios will be thinking about what kind of remedial exercises he can do to slowly and gradually build up his resilience to match exposure. He’s clearly gone in and played matches where he’s not physically prepared and the assessment that he’s had has potentially not be rigorous enough."
| CAN IT BE DONE IN FOOTBALL? |
"We were screening players, we had Aaron Ramsey in the lab back when he was playing with Cardiff City, and we were looking at football-specific maneuvers that could expose people to injury, looking at asymmetry between those who are injured and those who are predisposed to injury, to try to identify those players who are on the edge of getting injured.
"If you imagine you had a bio-mechanical system that could tell you a player's levels of fitness now, or his technique now, and during the season you test them every month or so, you can actually predict which ones are going to become injured.
"No-one’s really done that properly in Premier League football, because it’s not traditional. It’s done in other sports but I think football has a lot of science in it and there are certain things that it doesn’t do particularly well, and that’s one of them. They have medic screening but they don’t really coincide it with a full-on bio mechanical analysis.
"In 2007 we did a study with the doctor for the Welsh team, and it was around the time there was the discussion about blades, blades on artificial surfaces, molded studs and metal studs.
"We did a study where we looked at how forces were going through the knees and ankles during cutting and running to see whether they changed as a function of the boot’s under-surface. Then we worked with an orthopedic surgeon, who was working with the team, and a doctor, and we were feeding back on certain players who would be less suited to those type of boots.
"It’s the same thing with Vincent: he could potentially benefit from some form of bio-mechanical screening and using that to drive his rehabilitation, building him back up so when he does get back into matches, any issues that start to arise can be analysed quickly. Activities or remedial rehabilitation can then be aligned to be specific to his requirements."
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