GWS Giants forward Jonathon Patton to visit doctor who helped resurrect Tiger Woods’ career
The Giants are confident a trip to the US to see the man who rescued Tiger Woods’ career will be the ‘final piece of the puzzle’ as forward Jon Patton targets a mid-year return.
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The Giants are confident resilient Jon Patton’s US trip to see the man who rescued Tiger Woods’ career will be the ‘final piece of the puzzle’ with the forward on track for a mid-year return to action.
Three knee constructions would be enough to test any athlete’s resilience but the club will see him off at the airport content they have a player in a good space — both in body and mind.
The 25-year-old will shortly head to Philadelphia to spend a week with knee reconditioning expert Bill Knowles — a man credited with helping save Tiger Woods’ career and who has also worked with the likes of Kobe Bryant and Andy Murray.
On the AFL front, Knowles worked with Daniel Menzel (then with Geelong) back in 2013 and helped West Coast’s Nic Naitanui back to fitness after a visit in 2017. The Demons’ Jake Lever is his most recent AFL patient with Patton set to land early next month.
And while Patton will be put through his paces, it is far from the first steps on a long and painful road.
He is putting in the hard yards at Giants HQ and staff are delighted with how he is tracking, almost eight months after his left knee gave way in training.
“He’ll leave in about three weeks’ time and spend a week over there with Bill Knowles, based in Philadelphia,” said Giants general manager of football Wayne Campbell.
“He’s training really well, running really well, doing some drills, he’s fit and that’ll be the final piece of the puzzle and we hope after that he makes a return some time mid-year.
“You wouldn’t rush one (recovery from a knee reconstruction), but given it’s his third we’re being overly cautious and overly patient at the same time _ which is just the right thing to do for his body and also his mind.
“He looks confident, comfortable and mentally strong, so that’s really good.”
Patton has enjoyed the company of Toby Greene for a chunk of his pre-season work and the Giants forward has also highlighted the player’s upbeat outlook.
“Jonny has been really unlucky with a few injuries but he’s remaining super positive,” Greene told The Daily Telegraph recently.
Co-captain Callan Ward will hopefully make a small step in the right direction next week following the diagnosis of a lateral collateral ligament strain — expected to sideline him for four to six weeks.
“He’s still in a brace and just needs that ligament to scar up and heal,” Campbell said. “I think he’ll come out of that brace and into a softer brace early next week, which means he can start to get around a little bit. It’s all going well at this stage and still the same sort of time frame of the first month of the season (to return).
“We’d prefer him out their obviously because he’s such a wonderful player and leader but we also think it’s an area of the ground where we’ve got some depth.”
Campbell added that Josh Kelly, Jacob Hopper and Zac Williams were all looking good for round one. The Giants will play an intra-club game on Saturday with Kelly and Hopper among those expected to feature.
