https://www.telegraph.co.uk/cricket/2022/10/03/jonny-bairstow-exclusive-heard-leg-snap-screaming-uncontrollably/?li_source=LI&li_medium=li-recommendation-widget

“I took a couple of steps down then slipped. By the time I crumpled into a heap, I was three-quarters of the way down. It’s all a blur, it happened so quickly.

“I yelped. Uncontrollable screams, the sort you hear on a rugby field. The adrenaline kicked in, and I knew I needed an ambulance. We rang the head physio at England straight away and asked where I needed to go and what I needed to do. The next three hours without painkillers were not too fun."

With no hope of being able to walk the 500 yards back to the clubhouse, Bairstow was lifted gingerly on to the back of a golf cart, his mangled foot raised on the back seat, and driven back to the car park.

"I was trying to be incognito and pretending it was OK" he recalled. "I got into my mate’s car and went to the hospital, 20 minutes away. I was on autopilot trying not to move it. I hopped from car to A&E and gave my name, but there was a long wait to see anyone so we made the decision to go to a bigger hospital in York, where the wait was shorter.”

The extent of the injury soon became clear. Bairstow had multiple fractures in his left fibula, which required a five-inch plate – leaving significant scars – when he was operated on in London a few days later.. He also dislocated his ankle, with some damage to both the syndesmosis and lateral ligaments. It was not set at a nasty angle, because the dislocation had popped out, then in again.

Weeks later, he is still having to manage swelling. There is no set return date, but it will not be until spring at the earliest, ruling him out of not just the World Cup, but also the one-dayers against Australia and South Africa, and the three-Test series in Pakistan.

“Everything should heal, but it will take time,” Bairstow says. “Naturally I am desperately disappointed. I have been quite upbeat for the last month, because it is such a freakish thing that’s happened, it’s difficult to get angry about. It’s such a freakish thing that’s occurred.”

Read more at https://www.telegraph.co.uk/cricket/2022/10/03/jonny-bairstow-exclusive-heard-leg-snap-screaming-uncontrollably/?li_source=LI&li_medium=li-recommendation-widget

RH