Full Motion Physio
Football
The Nation’s favourite sport
In Greater Manchester alone, we have 7 Football League clubs, 14 Non-league and over 60 semi-pro and amateur league clubs. Football is ingrained into the culture of the North West. It is a sport that is becoming more inclusive than ever, with women’s football growing in popularity at all levels. Age is no longer a barrier: Greater Manchester has more ‘Walking Football’ clubs than any other part of the UK.
For many of us, football is a lifelong passion….the passion to play, whatever the conditions. The semi-frozen pitch in the middle of November, as the sleet starts to settle on the churned-up turf. Or worse, after a hot dry spell in May, when the pitch feels as hard as concrete. We must be mad. But deep down there’s nothing that quite matches that moment when you put that winning pass through. Or deliver that crunching tackle that stops their key player in their tracks. Or make the save that keeps you in the game. Or, best of all, put the ball in the back of their net…
Football Physiotherapy: Injury Treatment
The demands that football makes on the body can lead to a variety of injuries, whatever level you are playing at. The most common football injuries involve lower limbs and can be the result of the acceleration, deceleration, twisting and jumping actions demanded by the sport. Injuries can range from muscle strains to fractures, impact injuries and damage to ligaments such as the ACL ligament and the meniscus, the ‘shock absorber’ of the knee joint.
Left undiagnosed and untreated, a football injury can end up affecting your ability to play in the long term. For this reason, it is important to get effective physiotherapy treatment to help you on the road to recovery, providing guidance, and where appropriate, referral to the relevant medical professional (for instance referral to a radiologist for a knee scan).
Even for minor problems, the question arises: “Could I have prevented it, by training differently? Should I use a different warm up routine before each match?” Football Physiotherapy can provide the answers.
Football Physiotherapy: Injury prevention
Of course, prevention is better than cure. To minimise the risk of injuring yourself playing football your training program should include strength and conditioning exercises, mobility work, stretches, and movement drills. These need to be football-specific. A good football physio can help you and your coaches integrate the right exercises into your training regime to help you stay fit.
Football injury: the mental challenges
Recovering from a football injury can be tough mentally. The frustration of being restricted, not being able to play. The time and perseverance required for some conditions to repair. The self-doubt…”will I get back to how I was before?”
The physiotherapist has a key role to play in addressing not just the physical elements of treatment but the emotional ones as well. Finding a football physio that you can trust, who understands the challenges you are facing, who can provide the reassurance that you are on the path to recovery: these things are often as important as the technical expertise of the physiotherapist. You want to feel that the physio is really ‘on your side’, as committed as you are, to getting you back to playing again.
Selecting a football physiotherapist
Whether it is help to fix a football injury or you just want to prevent future injuries, look for a physiotherapist with experience in the sport, who understands in detail the physiological demands that football makes on the body.
And it is important to get a treatment and training plan from the physiotherapist which takes into account any previous injuries you have had (whether or not these were incurred playing football) as well as any limitations that you are currently experiencing. In other words, a Treatment Programme that is genuinely tailored to you personally – not an ‘off-the-shelf’ exercise programme.
If you choose Full Motion Physio
I have experience working with footballers at every level of the game. This includes professional level football clubs (Wigan Athletic and Hyde F.C.) and local clubs including Avro F.C.
My focus is not simply treating and discharging my patients: I aim to provide you with the tools to help self-manage your recovery, giving you a sense of ownership and an understanding of the problem, to help you to get back in action as quickly as possible.
My approach is described in the Full Motion Method page. Extensive research has identified the essential elements for the best physiotherapy. The Full Motion Method covers each of these elements.
One last point: Early diagnosis and intervention minimises the risk of the injury getting worse.
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