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Michael Owen "Don't Call Me Injury Prone" Hmmm


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Guest neesy111

we're not stupid you know michael

 

MICHAEL Owen admits his physical breakdowns have wrecked his time on Tyneside – but the England international still strongly denies he is injury-prone.

 

Although Owen acknowledges that his decision to play for England in the last World Cup was a mistake as his body was not strong enough to cope with the demands of international football, Newcastle’s £16.5m record signing is annoyed by people who constantly claim he is vulnerable to injury. Owen travelled to Germany in 2006 despite playing just 20 minutes of first-team football for Newcastle in five months after he broke his foot in a freak collision with Tottenham goalkeeper Paul Robinson at White Hart Lane on New Year’s Eve.

 

It is a decision the striker claims he had to make, but it is also a decision he blames for the injury problems which have followed.

 

Owen has started just 60 games in almost four years at St James’s Park, and the 29-year-old argued his problems can be traced back to that accidental clash with his England colleague at the end of 2005.

 

He said: “There is no hiding from the fact injuries have been the bane of my time at Newcastle. It is frustrating, however, and people will probably laugh, but I know I’m not injury-prone.

 

“If you look at my time at Newcastle, the problems started when Paul Robinson landed on my foot against Tottenham just after Christmas. Loads of people get metatarsal injuries, but they are normally not as bad as mine. Nobody’s foot would not have broken in that situation.

 

“I’ve then rushed my preparations for the World Cup. I played half-a-game for Newcastle. After being in plaster for so long my leg was de-conditioned and with hindsight, I should never have gone to Germany with England.

 

“It’s easy to say that now, but if I had my time again I would still have gone because it was a World Cup. I’m not thinking what could have been, but with hindsight my leg was half as strong as it should have been.

 

“Muscles support limbs and I twisted my knee awkwardly and that was it. All that came from someone landing on my foot, so I don’t think it’s my fault.”

 

That knee injury, suffered in the first half of England’s 2-2 draw with Sweden in the final game of the group stage, ruled Owen out for the next ten months and he played just three games for Newcastle the following season.

 

In the last two seasons, however, Owen has played in a more respectable 57, 33 last season and 24 so far this time around.

 

It is a record, probably with more than one eye on the fact he has still not agreed

 

a new contract with Newcastle and will be a free agent at the end of the season, he is keen to defend.

 

He said: “I know I’ve had valid reasons for why I’ve picked up injuries. I had a reputation for being injury-prone because I’d had a few hamstring problems at Liverpool.

 

“At Real Madrid people said I was on the bench the whole time, but I started more games than I was a substitute.

 

“Then came the foot and knee injuries. Since then I’ve had hernia surgery – which is very common – and I was playing again and scoring nine days later against Everton. This season I twisted my ankle, which was another freak thing because I landed on the foot of the defender and that caused the problem.

 

“I can understand people saying I should have played more because nobody wants to play more than me, but it does frustrate me when people say I’m injury-prone.

 

“There is no way I go on to the pitch and I am more fragile than anyone else. The injuries I’ve had could have happened to anyone in those circumstances.”

 

Owen has only just returned to the Newcastle side following the ankle injury he suffered against Manchester City in January, but he realises he does not have time to ease himself back into things because of United’s relegation fears.

 

He added: “Hopefully the injuries haven’t detracted from me as a player. I’ve adapted my game as I’ve got older and my body has dictated that to an extent. When I was 18 and 19 I was flying down the wings like a greyhound, beating players and crossing the ball.

 

“Alan Shearer was the same, he changed his game and became more of a target man towards the end, but he still got the goals.

 

“Clever players will always manage to adapt, they will always find a way of prevailing even if their bodies change.

 

“The one thing I’ve got a history of is taking one or two games to get into my stride again, but we haven’t got time for me to do that. Hopefully my eye is in straight away and I start knocking the goals in again immediately.”

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“The one thing I’ve got a history of is taking one or two games to get into my stride again, but we haven’t got time for me to do that. Hopefully my eye is in straight away and I start knocking the goals in again immediately.”

 

 

Lets hope he is right :D Martins and Owen knocking in a few, and perhaps a few from the other areas would be nice to see again :D certainly would help us also :p

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“I’ve then rushed my preparations for the World Cup. I played half-a-game for Newcastle. After being in plaster for so long my leg was de-conditioned and with hindsight, I should never have gone to Germany with England.

 

“It’s easy to say that now, but if I had my time again I would still have gone because it was a World Cup. I’m not thinking what could have been, but with hindsight my leg was half as strong as it should have been.

 

This is the reason why I never warmed to Owen in a Newcastle shirt. We have always been used as a training camp for his England career. Poetic justice that his international career has nose-dived anyway.

 

I know he won't stay here unless nobody else wants him, but if he can score a few goals and keep us up he can leave on a half decent note.

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“I’ve then rushed my preparations for the World Cup. I played half-a-game for Newcastle. After being in plaster for so long my leg was de-conditioned and with hindsight, I should never have gone to Germany with England.

 

“It’s easy to say that now, but if I had my time again I would still have gone because it was a World Cup. I’m not thinking what could have been, but with hindsight my leg was half as strong as it should have been.

 

This is the reason why I never warmed to Owen in a Newcastle shirt. We have always been used as a training camp for his England career. Poetic justice that his international career has nose-dived anyway.

 

I know he won't stay here unless nobody else wants him, but if he can score a few goals and keep us up he can leave on a half decent note.

 

I think that's a bit harsh TBH, most players would go to a World Cup if they were even half-fit. I'm sure loads of them have - it doesn't mean they don't care about their club.

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Ive then rushed my preparations for the World Cup. I played half-a-game for Newcastle. After being in plaster for so long my leg was de-conditioned and with hindsight, I should never have gone to Germany with England.

 

Its easy to say that now, but if I had my time again I would still have gone because it was a World Cup. Im not thinking what could have been, but with hindsight my leg was half as strong as it should have been.

 

This is the reason why I never warmed to Owen in a Newcastle shirt. We have always been used as a training camp for his England career. Poetic justice that his international career has nose-dived anyway.

 

I know he won't stay here unless nobody else wants him, but if he can score a few goals and keep us up he can leave on a half decent note.

 

I think that's a bit harsh TBH, most players would go to a World Cup if they were even half-fit. I'm sure loads of them have - it doesn't mean they don't care about their club.

 

Shearer did in '98 to be fair. Was clear to see the second half of that season that he was nowhere near good enough/fit enough to go to the World Cup, but he did.

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Ive then rushed my preparations for the World Cup. I played half-a-game for Newcastle. After being in plaster for so long my leg was de-conditioned and with hindsight, I should never have gone to Germany with England.

 

Its easy to say that now, but if I had my time again I would still have gone because it was a World Cup. Im not thinking what could have been, but with hindsight my leg was half as strong as it should have been.

 

This is the reason why I never warmed to Owen in a Newcastle shirt. We have always been used as a training camp for his England career. Poetic justice that his international career has nose-dived anyway.

 

I know he won't stay here unless nobody else wants him, but if he can score a few goals and keep us up he can leave on a half decent note.

 

I think that's a bit harsh TBH, most players would go to a World Cup if they were even half-fit. I'm sure loads of them have - it doesn't mean they don't care about their club.

 

Shearer did in '98 to be fair. Was clear to see the second half of that season that he was nowhere near good enough/fit enough to go to the World Cup, but he did.

 

Who wouldn't though? Most players only get a couple of opportunities like that... can't hold it against them.

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Ive then rushed my preparations for the World Cup. I played half-a-game for Newcastle. After being in plaster for so long my leg was de-conditioned and with hindsight, I should never have gone to Germany with England.

 

Its easy to say that now, but if I had my time again I would still have gone because it was a World Cup. Im not thinking what could have been, but with hindsight my leg was half as strong as it should have been.

 

This is the reason why I never warmed to Owen in a Newcastle shirt. We have always been used as a training camp for his England career. Poetic justice that his international career has nose-dived anyway.

 

I know he won't stay here unless nobody else wants him, but if he can score a few goals and keep us up he can leave on a half decent note.

 

I think that's a bit harsh TBH, most players would go to a World Cup if they were even half-fit. I'm sure loads of them have - it doesn't mean they don't care about their club.

 

I am looking at Owen in the context of his whole career at Newcastle, from his reluctance to come here in the first place right through his hedging on a new contract praying that someone will offer him a route out. Not that I begrudge him the opportunity to better himself but why should I give a flying fuck about his England career when it's wrecked his Newcastle one?

 

 

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Ive then rushed my preparations for the World Cup. I played half-a-game for Newcastle. After being in plaster for so long my leg was de-conditioned and with hindsight, I should never have gone to Germany with England.

 

Its easy to say that now, but if I had my time again I would still have gone because it was a World Cup. Im not thinking what could have been, but with hindsight my leg was half as strong as it should have been.

 

This is the reason why I never warmed to Owen in a Newcastle shirt. We have always been used as a training camp for his England career. Poetic justice that his international career has nose-dived anyway.

 

I know he won't stay here unless nobody else wants him, but if he can score a few goals and keep us up he can leave on a half decent note.

 

I think that's a bit harsh TBH, most players would go to a World Cup if they were even half-fit. I'm sure loads of them have - it doesn't mean they don't care about their club.

 

Shearer did in '98 to be fair. Was clear to see the second half of that season that he was nowhere near good enough/fit enough to go to the World Cup, but he did.

 

Who wouldn't though? Most players only get a couple of opportunities like that... can't hold it against them.

 

That's kind of my point. You can't begrudge him it. Kieron Dyer was the same in 2002.

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Guest iliketoonarmy

He is good or not, you decide. The fact is that he is not the man who can save Newcastle from relegation.

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Reads like he's filling in part of a person specification section on a job application. "I'm not injury prone because yadda yadda yadda, I've adapted my game, I'm a clever player, I would love to play for your CL club and I am certainly good enough for it."

 

Dyer, Woodgate, Bellamy, Emre, anyone recognised as being injury prone could say the same thing and peddle the same excuses. Fact is that in Owen's four years of being with us, his longest uninjured playing spell will have been the five or six months that he played in midfield towards the end of last season, a spell which many injury prone players tend to manage at some point or another (Woodgate was fit for nearly a whole season after 2.5 years of "freak injuries" with Madrid). Even then, with some of Owen's fanboys saying how he was no longer injury prone after half a season, what did he do? He went and got himself injured so that he missed both preseason and the start of the new season.

 

Even if you discount the major injuries (which supposedly don't count as injuries because there's "reasons" for them happening), he's still picked up a large number of minor injuries, ones that have seen him out for a couple of weeks to a month or two. In his first five or six months with us before his first major injury, i.e. the collision with Paul Robinson, Owen was constantly picking up little injuries. He was injured practically every other game, usually for a period of two weeks for us, somehow fully fit for England matches, and then its back to playing a game or two for us before getting injured again. Note how he now seems to be less injury-prone than previously (but still injury prone) now that he's no longer in the England squad - clearly he's not capable of playing too many games in the tough tackling Premiership on top of international games, something which his spell at Madrid proves (less physical league, less games). Even so, if you add to the numerous minor injuries the fact that he's picked up long term injuries after colliding with a goalkeeper, walking backwards on the pitch, landing on a defender's foot, etc etc, how can he be anything other than injury prone? How "unlucky" can someone get before they're recognised as being players who will regularly be attracting that "bad luck" every so often?

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So he finally admits he shouldn't have gone to that world cup.

 

Loads of us on here said it at the time and knew it was a bad move that we felt would cost us and it did. He has been paying for it ever since.

 

An injury doesn't have to be your fault for you to be injury prone Michael. You are injury prone. You have been your whole career only now it has become almost comical.

 

So fed up of this guy it's untrue.

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Guest michaelfoster

So he finally admits he shouldn't have gone to that world cup.

 

Loads of us on here said it at the time and knew it was a bad move that we felt would cost us and it did. He has been paying for it ever since.

 

An injury doesn't have to be your fault for you to be injury prone Michael. You are injury prone. You have been your whole career only now it has become almost comical.

 

So fed up of this guy it's untrue.

 

This

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Guest ObaStar

what pisses me off about this interview is that its one of the first interviews he's given in the last few weeks. and all he talks about is his injuries and how he can still score goals (hint hint man city come get me this summer). He is captain of United but does not say anything about how the team needs to fight every game and needs the fans behind them or any of that stuff. Its left up to Nicky Butt and Steven Taylor to show any leadership.

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what pisses me off about this interview is that its one of the first interviews he's given in the last few weeks. and all he talks about is his injuries and how he can still score goals (hint hint man city come get me this summer). He is captain of United but does not say anything about how the team needs to fight every game and needs the fans behind them or any of that stuff. Its left up to Nicky Butt and Steven Taylor to show any leadership.

 

He answers the questions the journalist asks, and then the journalist decides which quotes to publish to fit his story angle.

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