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The Cost of Injury

With Pompey quite seemingly injury-hit in midfield, I started to think as to how much this could cost us, not only on the pitch but also financially.

Now I don’t have information or even a vague guess at what any of our players will be taking home wage-wise, and to be quite honest, I don’t really care. The thing I am far more interested in is how the club will be affected on and off the pitch due to untimely injuries, and more frustratingly, injured loan players.

Let’s start off with Tareiq Holmes-Dennis – a player we took on-loan from Premier League outfit Huddersfield in the summer. THD got injured during his Pompey debut and quite unfortunately has suffered a season-long injury, something that no-one could have predicted. However, we are now paying wages for a player who is not going to feature for Pompey all season, who isn’t going through rehabilitation with Pompey and has gone back to Huddersfield.

I know there was some discussion and reports around the time of injury about paying his wages, and I guess it’s not Huddersfield’s fault, but I can imagine the impact on THD’s wages will be much greater for Pompey than Huddersfield, now that they’ll be receiving Premier League parachute payments.

Mark Catlin told the News at the time: “When you sign a player on a season-long loan, that is the contract and both clubs are committed to honour that contract.

“It is irrelevant whether the player is injured or not. That’s the deal.”

Stuart O’Keefe, another player who we brought in on-loan, is now crocked until mid-April – having made 19 appearances in all competitions for Pompey this season since joining on-loan from Cardiff City.

With O’Keefe having made his last appearance against Bury in December, that’s a good five months that O’Keefe will be working his way back from injury – with the player spending a good chunk of his loan-deal on the sidelines.

Again, this isn’t O’Keefe’s fault, it’s not Pompey’s fault and it’s not Cardiff’s fault, but the wages and space in the squad now taken up by two players brought in on-loan that are now injured for a long period of their loan term is exceptionally frustrating.

Add that to Danny Rose who won’t play again this season and his contract up in the summer, Milan Lalkovic, who has only made a handful of appearances for Pompey since joining in July 2016 thanks to a number of injuries suffered around his Achilles as well as a short loan-spell, and Jack Whatmough, who suffered a knee injury in September and will be lucky to play again this season, that’s five long term injuries on Pompey’s books.

Short-term we’re missing Gareth Evans, Conor Chaplin and Kyle Bennett, who weren’t risked in the Reserves game against Everton mid-week, but should be back soon, and then el Capitan Bret Pitman, who isn’t the spring chicken he used to be, is always shrugging off knocks.

Could this well hinder any chances of pushing for promotion and the play-off places, with five sets of wages and five spaces in the squad, taken up by injured players, and with a slight lack of resource – or unwillingness to spend it at least, this could be a major part in the second half of Pompey’s season.