Panthers winger Dallin Watene-Zelezniak plays full 80 minutes with fractured jaw
PENRITH’S international winger Dallin Watene-Zelezniak took a page out of John Sattler’s book by finishing a game of rugby league despite breaking his jaw — only he played the next week as well.
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THIS will go down in Panthers folklore.
Penrith’s international winger Dallin Watene-Zelezniak took a page out of John Sattler’s book by finishing a game of rugby league despite breaking his jaw — only he played the next week as well.
Watene-Zelezniak fractured his jaw during Penrith’s 24-14 win over Parramatta, but didn’t report the soreness to the club’s medical team and then played the full 80 minutes against South Sydney last Saturday.
It will be remembered as one of the most heroic individual performances in Penrith’s 51-year history, evoking memories of Rabbitohs great John Sattler, who played almost the entire 1970 grand final against Manly with a broken jaw.
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Watene-Zelezniak underwent surgery yesterday and will be sidelined for four to six weeks.
It continues a horror week for Penrith after props Sam McKendry and Tim Browne were ruled out for the rest of the season.
McKendry suffered his third season-ending knee injury while surgeons removed three centimetres of Browne’s bowel following a crunching tackle in the Panthers’ NSW Intrust Premiership hame.
Browne’s spleen and kidney were also damaged in the hit.
It was only after Watene-Zelezniak underwent X-rays on Tuesday did he realise his jaw was actually fractured.
“He played with a fractured jaw – it’s as simple as that,” said Panthers group CEO Brian Fletcher.
“Dallin completed the game against Souths. It was courageous. He’s a good kid, he doesn’t do anything wrong.
“It was only sore after the Parramatta game when he was eating solid foods. He just thought it was a knock.
“Dallin was mashing up his food to make it easier to eat and so not to hurt as much. But it just didn’t go away.
“He got the doctor to look at it (after the Souths) game, he got an x-ray and there was a hairline fracture.”
Doctors claim he could have played this weekend but another knock to the jaw could have sidelined Watene-Zelezniak for 12 weeks.
Watene-Zelezniak only recalls copping a knock in a tackle against the Eels.
“If he copped a bad knock, and it made the injury worse, it could have been a major injury. This way, it’s still major, but it’s a four to six weeks recovery period,” Fletcher said.
Sattler spoke last night of Watene-Zelezniak’s gutsy performance.
“It sounds like a heroic effort,” Sattler told The Daily Telegraph. “Anytime you put the team above yourself, whether through injury or perseverance, it always shows a sign of courage; and the values of a player.
“To play an entire game with a fractured jaw, from experience, I know the amount of discomfort.
“Adrenaline gets rid of the pain and it becomes discomfort and you have to know where to put your head in certain situations on the field. The pain comes when the adrenaline dies down in the dressing room after the game.”
Like Sattler, Former Roosters star Shaun Kenny-Dowall played 65 minutes of the 2013 grand final with a broken jaw.
Watene-Zelezniak has become the second player to sustain a broken jaw this year after Cronulla winger Sione Katoa suffered the same injury in round one.
The NRL does not believe there is any pattern behind two players having broken jaws in a fortnight.
Watene-Zelezniak is due back between rounds six and eight. Having now suffered his third ACL in three seasons, there are fears McKendry may not play again.