Former Manchester United defender Patrice Evra played with raw chicken in his boot for months. This is what he said in one of his interviews. A French footballer told of a case when an opponent stepped on his foot and seriously injured it, but he did not lose his head and found an unexpected solution to the problem.
In the hospital, I told Monaco coach Didier Deschamps: “It hurts too much. I can not play. I can’t even walk!
Patrice Evra
Photo: Shaun Botterill/Getty Images
However, the team needed me and the doctors tried everything to relieve my pain. Nothing worked. Then one of the club workers said to me: “Why don’t you go old school?” I exclaimed, “What do you mean?” He explained: “Just put a piece of chicken in the trunk.”
Patrice Evra
Photo: Matt McNulty/Getty Images
It seems crazy, but I’m an open person. So I went to my local butcher. The butcher said, “What do you want?” I responded: “A piece of chicken, but very thin.” He said, “Thin? How much does it cost? I said, “I’m going to put it in my trunk.”
He just laughed, but I went home with the chicken. Then I ordered new boots: one size 42.5 and the other size 44. I tried to pass the ball. The sensation was normal. It hurts, but it’s tolerable.
So I ended up playing with a chicken in a boot for four months. I didn’t train with her (my mother would never forgive me for wasting food), but before every game I visited my butcher, who said: “Good morning, Patrice. Are you as usual?
Chicken allowed me to play so well that in January 2006 I moved to Manchester United.
Photo: Alex Livesey/Getty Images
doctor’s opinion
Main doctor: traumatologist-orthopedist, podiatrist (specialist in foot diseases)
“Patrice Evra’s experience is definitely unconventional. It is interesting that if classical treatment is used, medicine is guided by documentation, research, laboratory data and other evidence of treatment methods. In the case of intuitive therapy, one must trust in the possible effects that can lead to the elimination of pain.”
Suppose that an opponent, having stepped on Patrice’s foot, in addition to a bruise, could have caused an injury in the form of a closed fracture of one of the phalanges of the finger. In this case, the pain was pronounced and was especially aggravated by pressure on the toes with narrow shoes.
Photo: istockphoto.com
In soccer there are not many attributes that can affect the game. One of the main ones is the boots. Among athletes there is an opinion that shoes should match all the individual characteristics of the foot as closely as possible.
Some soccer players keep their feet in warm water along with their shoes to ensure a better fit with the boots. It is believed that in this way the skin takes the shape of the foot, which has a beneficial effect on the athlete’s game.
This may have been a contributing factor to the pain he felt when Evra was hit in the foot. After an injury, the toe swells and tight shoes begin to put additional pressure on the damaged area, increasing the pain.
Also read:
An orthopedic doctor named 6 things to consider when choosing insoles for sports
Patrice noticed that in addition to putting the chicken in, he changed his shoes and the new boot was a size and a half larger than usual.
The chicken could play the role of an additional softening element, a kind of “cotton” that protected the painful area from additional pressure and trauma. The soft structure of the chicken meat prevented the toes from making strong contact with the boots, thus reducing the pain.
It is difficult to retrospectively exclude the possibility of additional exposure to raw meat in the form of proteins or fats it contains. It can even be assumed that the chicken that Patrice Evra used was raised with natural feed, without harmful additives or, on the contrary, the meat contained antibiotics, perhaps other elements that influenced the healing of the athlete’s injury.
Photo: istockphoto.com
The most basic message that can be extracted from this case of a non-standard approach is openness to the new, even if it is not the most obvious.
If we summarize some general results of all of the above, we can conclude that “home remedies” cannot be ruled out as an additional treatment method that will complement the main one. However, it is worth noting that in cases of health problems, one should rely on the opinion of doctors and use any remedy that affects the body only after consulting a doctor.
Also read:
How can you tell from your shoes that you have foot problems? the doctor told him
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