Hatzidiakos next in growing line of Greeks to suffer ACL injury

Pantelis Hatzidiakos, who will miss the rest of the current campaign, has joined the growing line of Greek footballers to suffer the anterior cruciate ligament injury.

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In great form, Hatzidiakos was rapidly developing this season with both AZ and the Greek national team, but a devastating anterior cruciate ligament injury suffered in a UEFA Europa League encounter against Partizan Belgrade has prematurely ended his campaign:

Hatzidiakos certainly isn’t the first footballer from Greece to encounter this injury. Let’s take a look at other Greek national team representatives who have ruptured their anterior cruciate ligament in recent years:

Petros Mantalos

Lightning struck twice for the AEK captain. In March 2015, the attacking midfielder suffered his first anterior cruciate ligament injury when playing against Olympiacos in the Greek Cup, before the same thing happened in September 2017 during a Super League game at Panionios.

To his credit, Mantalos has bounced back well on both occasions, and he is one of the few players in this AEK team who is capable of providing an attacking spark. Nevertheless, given his inconsistency and lack of progression to the next level, many feel that his two major injuries have somewhat spoiled his career.

Kostas Fortounis

Fortounis received the injury at the worst time possible. Last season, the 27-year-old was in scintillating form for Olympiacos, but disaster struck when he fell to the ground in a pre-season friendly against Hamburg in July. Subsequent tests revealed that the naturally gifted midfielder had ruptured his cruciate ligament.

His loss has severely taken its toll on Olympiacos. While Mathieu Valbuena has performed well in his role, Olympiacos have lacked the direction and leadership with Fortounis offers, something which has resulted in the Erythrolefki gradually dropping off the boil. There is hope that Fortounis will return towards the end of the campaign.

Lazaros Christodoulopoulos

Christodoulopoulos was the subject of major controversy in the summer of 2018 when he transferred from AEK to Olympiacos. At the start of the season, the threatening winger did impress in Piraeus, but his campaign came to an early end in February as he suffered the ACL injury in, ironically, a match against Olympiacos at the Karaiskakis Stadium.

The 32-year-old is still yet to make his long-awaited return to competitive action.

Nikos Karelis

Not that long ago, Karelis was regarded as one of the most promising strikers in Greek football, but his career has since fallen apart. His ACL injury at Brentford in late October sums up his luck in recent years.

At Genk, the imposing forward did show flashes of his potential, but he wasn’t consistent enough and his loan spell at PAOK was nothing short of a disaster. Nevertheless, taking into account that he is still only 27 years of age, Karelis still has time to get back on track when he recovers from this blow.

Karelis, incidentally, was hit by the same injury in December 2016.

Kyriakos Papadopoulos

The career of the commanding centre-back has been completely ruined by injuries. In November 2012, Papadopoulos picked up the ACL injury at Schalke 04, and he has since regularly been plagued by several knocks. Papadopoulos has fallen into oblivion in Germany with more injury problems and Hamburg suffering relegation in the 2017/2018 season.

The centre-back, 27, was out between July 2018 and March 2019 with cartilage damage.

Papadopoulos is fully expected to leave Hamburg in the upcoming winter transfer window.

Dimitris Kolovos

Kolovos has twice had the rather unfortunate fate of rupturing his anterior cruciate ligament. At the age of 18, the injury could have ended his hopes of becoming a successful professional football, but he battled back and later went on to represent Olympiacos.

Sadly, history repeated itself in February 2017 at Mechelen. Kolovos, though, returned a stronger player, notably scoring a famous goal for the senior national team at Bosnia in UEFA Euro 2020 qualifying this year. Kolovos is now playing his football at Panathinaikos.

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