The Gold Coast SUNS have elected to send Matt Rowell in for surgery, meaning the midfielder is expected to miss the next three months of the 2020 AFL season.
Rowell dislocated his shoulder when he made impact with the ground during a tackle midway through the first quarter in the Round 5 match against Geelong on the weekend.
He left the field and did not return for the remainder of the match.
SUNS GM – Football Operations Jon Haines told the Qscan Injury Update that the decision to undergo surgery was one the club made in consultation with specialists and Rowell and his family.
“Matt met with a surgeon again today in Sydney and the outcome from that is he’ll undertake some surgery early next week,” Haines said.
“This is the first real injury that Matt’s had in his whole career so it was a new experience for him.
“We wanted to make sure that Matt’s parents and Matt himself had really good input and a good understanding of the options available to them.
“Ultimately it was a decision that Matt had to make so we had to make sure that we laid all the evidence and all the research and all the information out for him and his family to consider and for them to make an informed opinion which they have.”
The plan is for Rowell to undergo surgery in Sydney and stay with the team before returning to the Gold Coast after Round 7.
While it’s hard to predict an exact timeframe, Haines said injuries of a similar nature usually require at least 12 weeks of rehabilitation.
“It will be quite a significant amount of time out of the game,” he said.
“Typically these can be a three month and beyond recuperation period so we’d expect that will be typical of his case but we’ll see how it progresses.”
In other news, Irish recruit Luke Towey has come out of the scratch match over the weekend with a fractured eye socket.
Haines said Towey too would require surgery which he would have this week.
“It was quite a nasty injury and just an unlucky elbow to the eye,” Haines said.
“He’ll have surgery this Thursday and then obviously he’ll require some time out of the game to make sure that heals properly as well.”
