Effects of Knee Injury on Knee Proprioception in Soccer Players

This study examines the effects of knee injury on knee proprioception in soccer players. Findings suggest that knee injuries can significantly impact proprioception and functionality in soccer players.

Running head: SPORTS SCIENCE
Sports Science
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Proprioception is clinically defined by the ability to reposition a joint of the human
body to its primary position. In case of football the well-functioning of the knee joints is very
crucial for the footballer. Therefore among the footballers it is very common to have a knee
injury during their game. Hence it is very important to practice proprioception training for
the footballers for maintaining the effectiveness of the knee joints of the footballers (Alhajaya
2015). Hence, in order to prevent injuries the soccer players used to do such training in their
training schedule.
The anterior cruciate ligament (ACL), mainly controls the operation of the knee
movements in six different directions that comprises of three translations and three rotations
and along with this, also help in the occurrence of screw-home mechanism that take place
during tibial and femoral rotation of full knee extension. Therefore, it is assumed that, the
ACL is also playing a crucial role in the knee proprioception of human body (Alhajaya 2015).
The study of Ralph et al. (2014), showed effect of injury on the knee proprioception among
injured and uninjured soccer players,. This study showed that soccer players with injured
ACL had higher mean angle of error. Whereas, the uninjured control group of this study (n=
170), had the standard mean difference of the mean angle of error was almost 0.52◦ (95% CI:
0.41 to 0.63; P < 0.001;I 2 = 63%). The study of Nagarajan (2015), conducted a comparative
analysis among the injured and uninjured soccer players in order to assess the knee
proprioception of those players. Lack of desired proprioception due to injury can alter the
steady posture and movement of the knee of the football players. In this study, a cross
sectional comparative analysis technique was used. The male football players were included
in this study and they were medically diagnosed with first and second degree bilateral and
unilateral knee injuries within the 5 months of time period . The subject population has the
age group of 20 years to 35 years. In this study , almost 108 injured and 94 uninjured knees
were studied in this whole study. In this Malaysia based study, the subjects were collected

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from the registered football associations of Malaysia. Footballers only had the experience of
one year, were included in this study. Any subject population with physiological trauma in
the lower limbs were excluded from this study. In this study, photographic analysis method
was used for analysis of the active proprioception error in the both knees of the participants.
Initially, the proprioception was measured at the inner range (0-20) , middle range (70-90)
and in outer range ( 120-140) for both the knees. After collecting the data, the independent t
test was used to analyse the data to examine any significance difference among the injured
and uninjured subjects of this study. In this study, P value of < 0.05 had considered as
significant difference in the proprioception errors among the injured and uninjured
footballers. The result of this study showed that, the injury in knee had significant effects on
the knee proprioception of the footballers. The mean value of proprioception error of injured
knee was 6.08 and SD was 3.23. On the other hand in case of uninjured knee the value was
almost 5.55 and 2.63 respectively. The t value of 2.21 showed significant difference with a P
value of < 0.03. In another study by (), showed the importance of uninjured knee joints
among the female soccer players. In this study, 12 female soccer player in the age group of
19.5 ± 2.65 years. In this study, the, maximum voluntary contraction (MVC) data were
collected in order to examine the importance of knee proprioception among the uninjured
soccer player. The result showed that, high level of knee proprioception is very crucial for
such high intensity contact sports and any injury or excessive overload in the knee joints can
alter the dynamic movements or direction during the time of running (Iwańska et al. 2015).
The Study of Read et al. (2016) showed that due to the knee and ankle ligament injury, the
proprioception of knee is decreased. Therefore it is observed that region lowered control of
frontal plane while landing on the ground and that are reported by the male soccer players
who have experienced ACL injuries in their carrier. Along with this in various studies it is
also reported that such positioning of the knee are also associated with the enhanced risk

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factors of that players while comparing with a non-injured soccer player. Injuries in the
lower limbs of the soccer players, mainly the knee injury, can cause alteration of
neuromuscular controls of that region for example activities like running, cutting and landing
from a jump is altered due to such injuries. However, no such incidences are reported by the
uninjured soccer male or female players. Due to knee injury of the soccer players, the knee
and hip flexion angles are reduced and such symptoms are indication of According to
Letafatkar et al. (2014), stated that, the history of injury among the soccer players, can reduce
their functionality of the knee joints. In this study, almost 18 female and 17 male soccer
players were recruited as sample population of this study. A significant differences was
found was among the injured group and non-injured group of that study through the one way
ANOVA test. In a study with 36 players, it was found that, among the total 36 subjects, 35
subjects reported about the musculoskeletal imbalances >10% and alteration in the range of
motion of the leg hip joint was also reported by them (Daneshjoo et al. 2013).
Hence, it can be said that the knee injury is very common among the footballers in all
over the world. However, it is very crucial for them to maintain the flexibility and accurate
knee proprioception in order to perform in a highest level. The injury in the knee joints can
alter the knee proprioception among the players and such incidents can reduce the
functionality of the soccer players while comparing with the non-injured players.

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References
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