Cruciate ligament tear! Bitter diagnosis for Sabine Lisicki
Another serious injury throws Sabine Lisicki far back. The return to the tour will be extremely difficult for the former Wimbledon finalist.
by SID
last edit:
Nov 11, 2020, 05:05 pm
Sabine Lisicki smiled bravely. Leaning on crutches and with a thickly splinted knee, the long-suffering 31-year-old posed for the camera and shared the next devastating news: cruciate ligament rupture. Again, the former Wimbledon finalist will have to stay away from the WTA tour for at least half a year, probably longer. Lisicki's career path has been paved with serious setbacks.
"From now on, we only look ahead," she wrote on Instagram: "I have a long and hard road ahead of me to come back, but I am very fortunate to be surrounded by the best medical team." Lisicki has already survived the operation.
Barbara Rittner, Head of Women's Tennis in the German Tennis Association (DTB), suffers with Lisicki. "I'm terribly sorry, a cruciate ligament rupture is one of the worst injuries for a ball player," Rittner told SID. Lisicki had recently struggled enormously to get back, now the body is on strike again: "I have no words either."
The accident happened on Monday in Linz in the double competition. At the side of her British partner Jodie Burrage, Lisicki tried to run a ball in the first round duel, bent away and immediately grabbed her knee. When the score was 6: 5, she finally had to give up, tears flowed and she was taken off the pitch. An MRI examination in the evening then brought the bitter diagnosis.
It wasn't until the end of August that she celebrated her first victory again after more than a year of tour abstinence. Previously, Lisicki had been struggling with glandular fever since July 2019. She has been thrown back by injuries time and again in her career, including the ankle, shoulder and, previously, the knee. In the world rankings, the former number twelve is only listed at 690th place.
The success of the high-serving Lisicki was some time ago. In 2014, she achieved her last tournament victory in Hong Kong, a year earlier she was on the holy lawn of Wimbledon before the big coup, but had no chance in the final against the French Marion Bartoli. Now Lisicki is fighting to ever return to the big courts.