Arsenal forward Gabriel Jesus recalls ‘scary’ World Cup injury incident – ‘I couldn’t bend my knee’ | OneFootball

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Football365

·21 March 2023

Arsenal forward Gabriel Jesus recalls ‘scary’ World Cup injury incident – ‘I couldn’t bend my knee’

Article image:Arsenal forward Gabriel Jesus recalls ‘scary’ World Cup injury incident – ‘I couldn’t bend my knee’

Arsenal forward Gabriel Jesus has recalled how he felt when he suffered his serious knee injury while playing for Brazil at last year’s World Cup.

The Gunners pulled off a major coup last summer as Jesus joined them from rivals Manchester City for around £45m.


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The forward was a major upgrade on their previous options up front. He was rightly lauded for his performances at the start of this campaign.

He has not scored as many goals as he would have liked (five in 16 Premier League games) but he is a great team player and he’s helped Arsenal get the best out of Bukayo Saka and Gabriel Martinelli.

Jesus’ performances for Arsenal earned him a place in Brazil’s squad for the World Cup in Qatar. He started against Cameroon in the group stages.

The striker was subbed off during that game and it was later revealed that he suffered knee ligament damage. He was out of action for around three months before he returned earlier this month.

Jesus has now revealed that he did not feel any “discomfort” until he was taken off.

“To be honest, I don’t know what happened, I don’t feel nothing but something changed,” Jesus recalled in an Arsenal/Adidas docu-series.

“I kept playing without pain, discomfort, nothing. Then I get subbed off, nothing. Then after, on the bench, it became so big I couldn’t bend my knee and I was so scared you know. I’ve always been good with pain, I have played football since I was 12 years old and have played with pain.”

Martinelli meanwhile has indicated that he did not know Jesus’ knee injury “was that bad”.

“At half-time, he said he was feeling something in his knee, but I didn’t think it was that bad,” Martinelli said.

“I think it was the day after the game, he went to do the scan and he was in the canteen where we were about to have lunch. He said there was something in his meniscus and he needed to have surgery.

“When you have this type of injury you get sad, you know? You could see in his face he was sad but at the same time you could see that energy that he has, that hunger that he has and he was telling everyone he was going to come back stronger and that’s what he tried to do.”

Jesus has come on as a substitute in Arsenal’s recent Premier League victories over Fulham and Crystal Palace.

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