Trio hit by new injury blows

A SECOND Coventry City player has suffered a serious knee injury on a matter of days.

Development squad player Dan Bartlett ruptured his cruciate knee ligaments in Monday’s Under-23s game against Hull City, and just days later Reise Allassani has been struck down with a similar long-term setback. The 23-year-old forward, who was on loan at non-League Dulwich Hamlet, suffered the same injury to his other knee while at Crystal Palace three years ago.

“It’s horrendous, absolutely horrendous,” said Sky Blues boss Mark Robins.

Tony Andreu and Jodi Jones ruptured their ACLs in 2016/17, Max Biamou and Jones (for a second time) in 2018/19, and now Bartlett and Allassani have added to the list.

“We speak about why because that’s been two a season for the last few seasons, and you look at it and there’s no-one anywhere near the majority of them,” said Robins.

“Dan’s was different because he was under challenge and it’s a terrible injury with a clean tear of the ACL and a straight-froward fix, you would think, but it’s just the time it takes for it to graft, and the longer you can give it the stronger the graft.

“They are both going to need some assistance surgically and mentally to help them through their rehabilitation on the physical side, so things are in place for them to achieve a full recovery.”

Asked how Allassani did his, he said: “He did it in training.

“Reise has got significant damage to his knee and he’s going to have a long period of recovery.

“I haven’t spoken to him yet but I will do. He’s still away down in London but we’ll get him back up and assess him and get his surgery sorted.

“It’s his second. When he was coming out of his contract at Crystal Palace he did his other knee.”

Robins added: “He was out getting games. He’s been really unfortunate because he’s picked up injuries that have curtailed any sort of progress.”