Crows star Rory Sloane thought his season might be over after eye injury against West Coast
Adelaide co-captain and star onballer Rory Sloane says he will play on Saturday in the Crows must-win game against Collingwood after suffering a bad eye injury last weekend.
Rory Sloane feared he had suffered serious eye damage and that his season was over after copping friendly fire from teammate Matt Crouch at Optus Stadium last Sunday.
The Adelaide co-captain — cleared to play in the must-win clash against Collingwood at Adelaide Oval on Saturday — revealed the knock to his right eye from fellow midfielder Crouch’s shoulder at a centre bounce contest at the start of the third quarter against premier West Coast had left him with blurred vision for more than 24 hours.
And he said it had him thinking he had torn the retina in his right eye for the second time, which would have ended his season.
“I started to think it was something similar to what I’ve had before,’’ said Sloane, still sporting a nasty black eye.
“I’ve had a torn retina in that eye before and I’ve busted this (left) eye socket, so we had to look after it.
“At the start my vision was really blurry, so I went to the bench, but normally, with a normal whack in the eye, the blurriness should go in about five or 10 minutes.
“But mine stayed there and got a little worse as the game went on, so the medical staff made a call (to rule him out for the rest of the game).
“Then the blurriness got worse as the night went on.’’
Sloane flew back to Adelaide with his Crows teammates on Monday and was taken straight from Adelaide Airport to see a specialist who, after examination, delivered him some good results which has enabled him to play against the Magpies.
“It’s hard to tell externally what’s wrong with your eye, you really need to sit down with a specialist and have them look right into it, which is always uncomfortable,’’ he said.
“But I got good results, with no structural or retina damage, which was important.’’
Collingwood ruckman Mason Cox suffered a torn retina in his left eye against Gold Coast two weeks ago and has been ruled out for the season.
Sloane said he trained strongly at Adelaide Oval on Thursday morning to prove his fitness for the Pies clash and that he was not risking further damage by playing.
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“I trained and feel good,’’ he said.
“I’ve got my vision back, my sharpness (in the eye) back, I’m good.’’
Sloane said he was shattered to miss most of the second half of the 10-point loss to the Eagles when the Crows were in with a strong chance of pulling off a big upset.
“It was so frustrating that I couldn’t be out there for the second half because it was such a good game to play in, I was loving it,’’ he said.
“Now we just have to win this week.’’