LUKE Crane was floating in the square ready to pounce on his fifth goal when he joined football’s long list of anterior cruciate ligament victims.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
His left leg crumpled in a routine marking contest, shooting pain through his body and career-ending thoughts through his mind.
That was on a cold winter’s night five months ago as his Portland team crushed Hamilton Kangaroos under lights at Melville Oval and emerged as a potential Hampden league finals contender in a tight season.
Now, as pre-season training hits full swing, Crane is almost halfway through the 12-month knee reconstruction recovery period.
He is no longer hobbling and is counting down the days until he’s given the all-clear to start straight-line running.
Here the former SANFL star shares the ups and downs of his journey so far.
The reaction
Crane was giving the Kangaroos’ defence headaches.
The nifty small forward thought he had his opponent out of position when he jumped for the ball.
He dropped the mark and landed on his leg.
“That will teach me to take the mark,” Crane joked upon reflection.
“Straight away I knew I was in a fair bit of strife.
“It felt like it almost snapped in half. It felt like I landed and it just folded over on itself.
“I remember it was instant pain and I was just in shock. And I remember a bloke abusing me on the sidelines.”
The intense pain, while unbearable, gave Crane a glimmer of hope.
He’d watched many players do their ACL and walk off the ground unassisted – short-term pain might be a long-term advantage.
The diagnosis
Crane’s worst fears were realised two days later when scans revealed the extent of the damage.
He’d torn his ACL and damaged his lateral and medial ligaments.
“I initially thought ‘that’s footy done’,” the 31-year-old former Magarey Medallist said.
“But the more I’ve got into my recovery (the more excited about playing I get).”
The initial disappointment of hurting himself again – injuries and illness such as concussion, hamstring strains and appendicitis have marred his three-season Hampden league career – was soon put aside as the enormity of the recovery period took over.
“At the start I probably didn’t realise the frustration that was about to come,” Crane said.
“You think you’ve done your knee, have the surgery and you probably don’t put into context that 12 months is a long time at the start.”
The recovery
Crane went under the knife in Geelong a week after his diagnosis.
The procedure was swift. He spent one night in hospital after the one-hour long surgery.
“They had me up trying to walk the next day on crutches, which I really struggled with,” he said.
He returned to the two-storey Portland house overlooking the beach he shares with wife Lindsee and took up residency on the couch.
Channel flicking became a part of his daily routine for two weeks.
“I was bedridden, to a degree. I could get up, but it was pretty painful,” he said.
“But they want you moving around pretty soon afterwards. They didn’t put me in a brace at all.”
Rehabilitation started straight away – exercises, such as calf raises, to strengthen the muscles around his knee.
“I was probably getting a little bit frustrated with it,” he said.
“I just couldn’t get it to move as much as I should have, especially when I started to see the physio and I was a bit behind where I should have been at the start.”
The scare
A three-week holiday to Bali in October, earmarked as a way to push Crane’s knee worries aside, almost turned into a nightmare.
“I thought I redid it, just jumping in the pool,” he said.
“I didn’t even think, went to step down and the step was a lot deeper than it should have been and I just felt it pop.”
Crane spent the first week of his tropical escape fearing the worst.
The joint felt loose and the thought of a second reconstructive surgery niggled in the back of his mind.
“It must have just been the scar tissue but that first week I thought I’d done it again,” he said.
“But we did heaps of walking – walking to waterfalls which was a bit stupid really, it wasn’t stable ground – and I managed to do all that, so thought it must be all right.
“Then the last week I managed to feel really good again.”
The progress
The movement Crane had in his knee after Bali proved a turning point.
For someone who had always excelled on the field, the slowness of his recovery had started to weigh on him.
“My physio was saying ‘you’re a fair bit behind where you should be’, which started worrying me,” Crane said.
“I read (Geelong footballer) Daniel Menzel’s website and he said ‘don’t stress too much about how long it takes you to get your movement back.’
“He said ‘I’ve done mine three times now and it doesn’t seem to matter which way you go’.”
Crane, who jumped on an exercise bike just weeks after his surgery, is now spending three days a week in the gym doing leg weights and balancing.
Swimming is also proving beneficial.
The itchy feet
A meeting with his physiotherapist on January 5 can’t come quick enough for Crane.
That’s when he could get the all-clear to begin straight-line running.
He had hoped to start this month but was warned the muscle was not strong enough around his knees.
“The surgeon had said don’t start running until five months anyway,” Crane reflected.
“He said there is no point coming back too early, there’s no gains in it for you.”
But the temptation is growing as his Tigers begin their 2017 preparations.
“In terms of gym stuff, I feel like I could do everything at the moment,” Crane said.
“In terms of everything else, it feels normal. It’s got to the point where I am the most frustrated because it’s got back to almost being normal but you’re still limited to what you can do.
“Before that I was still sore and it took me a while to get the flex back...so I always knew I wasn’t right.”
The pre-season
Crane stood on the sidelines offering encouragement as Portland players were put through a rigorous running program under the warm sun at Heathmere Recreation Reserve on Tuesday night.
Teenager Felix Jones left the field in his wake as players, old and young, tried to impress the third-year mentor.
Crane held a football but was unable to kick it. He pretended to follow through but thought better of it.
“I did kick at training the other night without even thinking and thought ‘nah, that’s not right’,” he said.
But being back on track is in itself a kind of therapy.
“That’s taken all my focus now, it’s a good thing in a way,” Crane said.
He is learning from new director of coaching Jason Saunders and assistant coach Jarrod Holt – both former senior mentors with ample experience.
And he is using his reduced on-field input to spend extra time with the Tigers’ players.
“It’s been a good thing in a way,” he said.
“But it is frustrating because I want to be out there leading the boys and that is hard to deal with.”