Transcript from Hege Riise Press Conference
April 24, 2003 - Women's United Soccer Association (WUSA)
Carolina Courage News Release
Courage midfielder Hege Riise
Thank you all for calling in. I just suffered an ACL ligament (tear) in Saturday's game. It happened when I was running after the ball. Someone was sliding in front of me and I tried to jump over and I landed and I wanted to get the ball so I twisted my knee. It's kind of the way it usually happens with an ACL. I'm disappointed of course but I will be back. There is the World Cup ahead and also another season so I haven't played my last game yet. It's been a long time since I had a serious injury. I am optimistic; I will do whatever I can to get back as soon as possible but I won't take any chances by further injury or something like that. I scheduled my surgery for May 15th. Dr. Garrett at UNC will have the surgery. I've seen him today and I also saw him in Norway this fall and he's a nice guy and I trust him a lot. For my rehab I will stay here and do whatever I can to get back as soon as I can and just want to be with the team and the Courage organization and help out any way I can. I have Cody Malley 24 hours a day and just do whatever I can to get back as soon as I can. Hopefully I will be here helping the team in any way I can. Just looking forward to the game on Saturday already.
Riise on the likelihood of returning to play in the WUSA in 2003:
Yeah, for sure. I can't say yes or no now but I enjoy so much playing in this league and for the Carolina Courage. If I'm healthy and my motivation is there and everything, I can't see that I'm not playing here another season.
Riise on returning to action in time for the Women's World Cup:
My first goal is to get to the World Cup. I just want to have something, some goal, to reach but I don't know for sure if I'm going to make it or not but I will have that as my first priority, but I won't risk anything for the World Cup. Maybe it will go my way, and the World Cup will be moved from China and it's going to be maybe a month later or anything so I'll just prepare for the World Cup and I'm hoping that everything will go well.
Riise on whether she would be disappointed if she could not participate in the World Cup:
My goal is to be in the World Cup but I'm realistic too, so of course I will be disappointed if I have the message that I won't be able to play in the World Cup but that's life and even so if that will be my last World Cup, you'll never know. I'm not that old!
Riise on whether this is the most serious injury in her career:
I haven't had this kind of serious injury. It was 10 years ago since I had my last injury so it's kind of a long time, I don't even remember. This is my most serious injury for sure and it's disappointing but that's how it is sometimes, that's the game and I will keep on working to get back. I don't think there was a tackle it was just that I was jumping over her and when I was landing I twisted my knee trying to get the ball at the same time that was in the other direction. So it was just twisting on my knee.
Riise on whether she knew the injury was serious at the time:
Yeah, it was true because I heard it popped and it was kind of loud so I get scared. It was hurting. I think so. I kind of felt that something was wrong but I said to Cody when he came, just give me a minute and 'll be back there but I couldn't. I was hoping but I couldn't.
Riise on what makes the US-Norway rivalry special:
Every game we play against the US, since my first game against them, it's fun to play. It's the rivalry and you don't have that many rivalries anymore I think. US and Norway is one of them and that's why it is so fun to play those games. It's always a good game and it's never a scoreless game. It's always going to have goals and always going to have to tackles and always going to have something exciting in there. I think it will be on for a long, long time.
Courage head coach Jay Entlich
Again, thanks for being on the call today. Obviously, losing a player like Hege Riise is a huge blow to our organization and also in my feeling, it's a huge blow to the WUSA. She's given her heart and soul to the Carolina Courage over the last two years and we know she'll continue to be a part of our team throughout her rehabilitation over the next four months. In the meantime, our staff has prepared a plan for the remainder of the season and with the timing of this injury, there's still much of the season left and every single person on our team and everyone in our organization believes that we're going to be successful. With 19 games left in the regular season, there's a lot of time left. Injuries are a huge part of the game and obviously this year they've been a huge part of our team, but every single player on our team has vowed to fight through these adverse times and to be successful and to do whatever it takes. Obviously you don't replace Hege Riise with one individual. We plan on replacing Hege with basically 11 individuals on the pitch and everyone has to take responsibility and step up and perform at an even higher level. In our minds, the road to success is always under construction, so this just makes us work that much harder and we're going to take it one step at a time. Our preparation is for this Saturday's game against New York and after this game we'll come back together as a team on Tuesday morning and start thinking about San Jose.
Entlich on how the loss of Riise will affect his lineup:
As far as our system goes, we are working on several new systems. Obviously, this system was built for players like Hege Riise. We may play the same system because we do have players that can step into that role, they know the system but we wouldn't hesitate to look at a new formation either though.
We still have 14 players that are training this week, so we're very confident in the players that we have. We obviously chose these players for a reason and we knew that this year was going to be difficult with National Team call-ups. We've had a plan since day one and we told all of our players that they would be getting significant playing time this year. They're ready, they've been ready since day one and they're looking forward to this weekend as is our organization and our staff.
Entlich on the impact of the injury on his team:
I think anytime you lose a player, at first the team was saddened. We met as a team, like I said, on Tuesday and everyone's come together and this week in training has been very intense. All of our spirits are up, we want to make sure that confidence is up and we're ready to play against New York. We want to take it one game at a time and we feel very good about the players that we have in our camp and that they can get the job done. Again you don't replace a Hege Riise with one player. I wouldn't necessarily say that we could put one player in and not miss a beat. Really the entire team has to take responsibility and every single player has to work that much harder whether it's offensively or defensively and many people don't realize how great of a defender Hege Riise is. We all talk about how great of an attacking player she was but she really added a lot to our team defensively as well. It just means that every single player is going to have to take ownership and we're going to have to find some, what I call, unlikely heroes now, players that will have to assume a lot more responsibility and not rely on Hege to produce the balls in behind the defense and her tremendous work rate and her vision. So we're just going to have to band together and some of the other players are going to have to step up.
Entlich on a new look Courage without Riise:
We're looking at several different players, Erin Baxter potentially playing as a holding mid, Robin McCullough playing as an attacking mid, Unni Lehn as an attacking mid, Kelsey Carlson as an attacking mid. So we're tinkering with different systems whether it's a 3-5-2 or a 4-3-3, a traditional 4-4-2, a 4-5-1. Really it's going to be by committee and we're going to have a variety of players that we feel comfortable playing in there. It'll probably be more or less a game time decision to see who we feel the most comfortable with over the course of the week through training.
Athletic Trainer Cody Malley on the likelihood of Riise's return for World Cup:
The operation is being done by one of the best surgeons in the world, Dr. Bill Garrett over at UNC. He's had a lot of experience both with US soccer national team players and other internationals and then the fact that Hege will be in market in North Carolina that I can work with her day in and day out seven days a week until she's back on the field. It's my personal goal and she's got a great work ethic, and she's going to do everything she needs to do and if everything goes the right way, there's no reason why she wouldn't play in the World Cup in China.
Cody Malley on treating the injury:
Right away, immediately following the surgery, our immediate goals are to basically treat the trauma that occurred during the surgery. There will be a lot of swelling, the range of motion will be very limited, so the number one goals are to get the swelling down as much as possible, regain the range of motion in the knee and begin to work on the strength. There is also a time element to allow the new reconstructed graft, new ACL graft to take hold in the knee for the body to basically anchor it down and heal and so there's a time where we're kind of on a holding pattern and then after that point we start a running program at 8 to 10 to 12 weeks just depending on how things are going, we start to incorporate functional activities, soccer related activities to try to mimic what Hege does on the field in as a protective environment as we can and it'll be a hard thing for Hege but it's something she'll be just fine doing and we'll guide her in the right way and we won't let her put herself in any danger and our goal is to, if she ends up reinjuring herself, that's a failure so we don't that ever to happen. We want to keep things going in the right direction and get her back.
Cody Malley on waiting two weeks before having the surgery:
Over the years, it's pretty well accepted by surgeons that immediately following an injury, the patient is better off to go into a surgery at full capacity minus, obviously, the ligament being torn. That means the initial swelling that takes place in the knee, the decrease in strength, the decrease in range of motion that we're dealing with right now. If we get back all those barriers before surgery, she's able to come back that much quicker so going into surgery earlier does not necessarily mean getting back earlier because there are more obstacles you have to overcome following the surgery. We get her full range of motion back, we get her strength all the way back. I told Hege, before she goes into surgery, she's going to feel like she doesn't need surgery. The only thing they're going to do is fix that ligament and we've got a strong knee with full range of motion and we just have to work on getting the swelling out and recapture the strength and recapture the range of motion following the swelling that comes from the surgery.
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Women's United Soccer Association Stories from April 24, 2003
- Transcript from Hege Riise Press Conference - Carolina Courage
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