Right, this one is really intense so consider yourself warned.
During her second-round Wimbledon match against Sorana Cirstea, Bethanie Mattek-Sands suffered a pretty horrendous knee injury that left her screaming for help.
It doesn’t make for easy viewing, and you can only imagine what it must have been like for those watching on Court 17.
You’ll be grabbing your knee at some point:
Just a devastating scene at Wimbledon as Bethanie Mattek-Sands goes down with an injury. pic.twitter.com/kqY6wQAcbS
— Sports Illustrated (@SInow) July 6, 2017
According to the Telegraph, tournament directors were forced to defend the speed of their reaction to her cries:
…her opponent Sorana Cirstea questioned the wait before she was taken to hospital in an emergency ambulance with a serious knee injury…
“I turned around and told them to bring a stretcher or something because I think everyone froze,” said Cirstea. “No one was having any reaction. [It] was heartbreaking because she went into shock. I think for a long time it was me, her husband and my physio.
“It felt forever. She kept saying, ‘Sorana help me’. I said, ‘I’m here, you are strong, you can do this’. I felt useless. I think she was too long on the stretcher. There are sports where you see something’s happening; straight away the help. It took a while so, of course, you wonder what would happen if it was a heart issue. But I think someone has to take the video and actually time and see how long it took.”
The All England Club later issued a statement in which they explained that the first treatment for Mattek-Sands from an ambulance technician had arrived within a minute of the incident and that the 32-year-old was then administered pain relief while she lay on the court.
The stretcher was waiting to escort Mattek-Sands off court just as soon as she was stabilised and had received the on-court medication.
Putting all that aside, it’s always sad to see a professional sportsperson writhing around in agony.
Unless it’s a footballer, because they’ll be back on their feet and right as rain within a minute.
[source:telegraph]
