How Is It Possible For A Football Player To Fail A Medical?

your team is about to sign a

new superstar when all of a sudden he

gets a failed medical

how does this even happen well this week

on justin's case we find out all the

questions you have on medicals like how

do super fit players fail medicals and

more right this way

hey welcome back to justin's case let's

dive right in and look at some

interesting cases of failed medical

exams

one of the biggest ever was that of

manchester united and netherlands

superstar rude van nistelroy

do you know the guy who made christiano

cry once

well the rude rude of course had a

legendary career that saw him join

manchester united in 2001

but did you know he was supposed to join

a year earlier initially they said no

because he was still going through an

acl tear

and then the next year if i remember

correctly once he had healed then they

assessed him and said okay you're good

to go that's right in 2000 sir alex

ferguson wanted young rude to join up

with the red devils from psv but

failed his medical exam he would have

been a club record signing at the time

about 25 million dollars the thing is

ruud hadn't played for a while due to

knee issues and those issues seem to

concern the manchester united medical

team of course rude went on to join a

year later and he became a club favorite

scoring lots of goals and royally pissed

off patrick vera martin keown and a

bunch of arsenal faithful before moving

on to real madrid in 2006

but

van nistelroy isn't the only player to

have a move scuppered over concerns to

his joints or ligaments in fact many

players may have moves pulled over

concerns about players health sometimes

those concerns might be serious but

other times it may be predicated based

on past injuries or just a medical

opinion that the player's body profile

or another factor could lead to future

problems let's give you one example here

there's one mysterious example where a

player's medical was cited quite

regularly in the media reports though

has never had complete verification in

the run-up to the 2018 world cup leon

had a new emerging talent on the way his

name

nabil

he was just scoring goal after goal

after goal after gore this guy was

ridiculous and he was arguably the most

exciting french prospect not named

zimbabe or dembele he even had an

admirer maybe a guy you've heard of

named jurgen klopp

fakir went to liverpool at one point he

got photographed in a kit and even did

an interview but then you want the truth

even i don't know i promise you i did my

medical and then they decided not to

sign me at some point they wanted to

have me believe it was because of my

knee

but an excuse needed to be found

the medical tests that i did at clear

fontaine were very clear my knee is

perfectly fine and i feel fine there are

no issues at all with my knee and

bielsakir who was trying to move to

liverpool

they did uh imaging of his knee and from

my understanding they were uncomfortable

with how much wear and tear they were

seeing in his knee following acl and

they were going to pay a lot of money

for him so for them from a risk reward

perspective it becomes you know is it

worth it for us to pay that much for a

player who we potentially

can only play at a high level for x

amount of years he care going on to sign

for the albertis in la liga apparently

he passed the medical there so like who

really knows what's going on so was it a

medical that stopped fakir from signing

for liverpool or not

who knows credit to nabil he's gone on

and still had a good career but if you

look at kind of how he's trained he

doesn't train as often as other players

either so there is still maybe some

long-term concern for him in that regard

the same thing actually happened to luik

hamid was on the verge of signing for

liverpool as well he ended up at chelsea

after a failed medical at liverpool

what's going on with liverpool's doctors

but it does beg the question do

different teams and medical staffs look

for different things in medicals i think

every club depending on

what level they're at how many games

we're going to play at the intensity

they play at they each have a different

level of acceptable risk that they're

willing to take and tolerate how can one

team say reject this player well another

team takes him or her in there's also

differences between medical staff some

might see one thing one way as more

risky some might say may see it as less

risky right and so there's still

variance in that as well but then in

general

definitely you're going to see some of

these top level clubs probably be a

little bit more risk-averse because one

you're probably gonna have to pay more

for a player just because a club selling

to a top club has to typically pays a

premium right knees and ligaments that's

just one piece of the health puzzle

though you want to see if that player

has any recall congenital you know birth

defects that might impact

kind of um their ability not only their

ability to play but also their long-term

longevity right if you're trying to buy

a player for five years right you want

the player to actually be able to play

that potentially longer some things can

show up in let's say different ways and

then secondly

those clubs are going to be involved in

these really high intensity matches

and so that's another aspect like for

example in the premier league the data

shows players are involved in more

quantity

of high intensity runs so there is more

demand on players so if you have a

player coming into that league who's not

used to it which you already know might

create some injury risk and now you're

seeing some stuff on the physical and

you're thinking huh you know if we

expand this out over two to three years

is this a player we can really rely on

or is this a player we want to pay x

amount for when we could go and use that

on

someone else who may not be quite as

good but they might be more available

and these things may not just threaten a

player's season but it could threaten

their life that yantuham is a legendary

french defender he has the most caps in

french history actually though hugo

doris will probably break that record by

like next year touham had a legendary

career at monaco parma juventus and

barcelona and he was all set up to end

it in paris with psg

but then guess what happened failed

medical yes to ham had a heart issue

that appeared he was already in his

mid-30s at that point so he just decided

to call it a career rather than risk

continuing and perhaps potentially dying

on the pitch and this has actually

happened a few tragic times in football

history you may remember martin villanfo

earlier this season seria aguero had a

heart issue detected he had an

arrhythmia first when he was 16 years

old and so he's something he's had

before

and it may be something now that's

evolved to the point where they're not

comfortable with him playing more

whether it's due to age whether it's due

to all these demands he's put on his

body as well the question is how does a

player go his whole career with this

issue only being detected later on in

life kingsley come on had an arrhythmia

they did an ablation on it to help get

rid of it and he's been fine since i

know it's always scary to hear that word

but it's not really that uncommon for

players to have some you know heart uh

issue if these top level athletes are

failing medicals what does that say for

those of us who sit around playing fifa

and eating potato chips and never

actually doing any exercise not me i

mean maybe y'all i don't know i'm that's

not me

[Music]

from my understanding i mean there's

always kind of bringing more and more

diagnostics on

kind of on what to look for and how to

potentially treat it i think the big

thing here that we're seeing is better

and better pre-streaming of it when

you're younger

right if you can recognize it younger

then you can treat it quicker right and

so that's really the key thing in these

cases is not just looking for it when

you already see a symptom it's making

sure every athlete goes through this

testing from the point that they're 12

13 14 years old where these things might

develop alright everybody listen up

before we go if you want to know more

about the medical side of the game like

for example how does ronaldo jump so

damn high you can check out our last

justin's case episode go ahead click it

alright alright that is my case for this

week please don't forget to like the

video if you are vibing with it you can

also subscribe and turn on notifications

if you want to help us out a bit and of

course leave a comment if you have some

thoughts yeah i read your comment i do

the ones that are nice or positive are

always appreciated the ones that share

your non-discriminatory opinions also

appreciated cool appreciate those anyway

have a great week and we'll be back next

week for more justin's case