Lewis fights back into contention from injury setback
Ten weeks ago, Clayton Lewis had given up on his dream of being involved in another Fifa World Cup Intercontinental playoff.
The Wellington Phoenix midfielder was in an ambulance receiving morphine to numb the pain in his ankle as his teammates celebrated a last-gasp win against Perth Glory on March 26.
“I’ve not felt pain like that but it was my first proper injury,” Lewis told the Weekend Herald. “Everyone was very cautious and no one wanted to move me that much.”
Lewis was eventually carted off the pitch, able to farewell his teammates just after the final whistle, before going to hospital. Later that evening, reality began to sink in.
“I guess I thought that was it,” said Lewis. “For those first two or three days, it was me thinking the rest of the [club] season done, the Intercontinental playoff done.”
But an X-ray showed no break before an MRI scan revealed the damage wasn’t as bad as initially thought.
Lewis set a target of being back in six to eight weeks and made it in five.
“I’ve very happy to be back in the mix,” said Lewis.
It’s not the first time Lewis has defied the odds in this World Cup cycle. He took a difficult phone call when Danny Hay selected his first 23-man squad to face Ireland and Lithuania in November 2019, with others preferred.
Lewis had ended his difficult time at Scunthorpe a few months earlier (23 games, including only four league starts, across two seasons) and was rebuilding his career at national league level.
“I wasn’t playing much,” said Lewis. “I understood where he was coming from.”
But Lewis fought his way back, establishing himself at the Wellington Phoenix as an effective deep lying midfielder with an eye for a pass.
Last year’s Olympic campaign was vital, as Lewis was in camp for six weeks and featured in four matches, including all 120 minutes of the quarter-final loss to hosts Japan.
“That was massive, learning the way we wanted to play.”
The 25-year-old has been in Marbella since May 23, part of the first group to arrive, with a singular focus.
“I need to get my fitness up as much as I can. I’ve only played 120 minutes in two months. They know what I can do on the ball, it’s just can I get that fitness back to where it was and hopefully put myself in contention for that game?”
If he takes the field against Costa Rica on June 15, he’ll be prepared.
Lewis is one of six survivors from the XI that started the World Cup playoff in Lima in 2017 and vividly remembers the magnitude of the occasion, with so much on the line.
“It was definitely the biggest game of my career,” said Lewis.
“I was pretty nervous before that game and hopefully I can take that into this game and embrace the whole moment, realise what we are here to do and what we need to make sure we are at it.”