Footy legend Jonathan Brown has become a haunting warning for footy players in 2020 after he made an ugly revelation about injuries on live television on Thursday night.
The Brisbane Lions champion has admitted that he has suffered a secret finger injury throughout his career and has permanent deformity in his left hand.
The Fox Footy analyst and popular breakfast radio host came to the end of Fox Footy’s live coverage of the Western Bulldogs victory over the Gold Coast when he said he should be operated on to repair a tendon in his left little finger.
It is a similar injury to that for which Collingwood superstar Jordan De Goey recently underwent surgery. De Goey will miss football for up to 10 weeks.
Brown continued to play to avoid missing football matches due to his injury – but he’s now paying the price.
When the topic of De Goey’s operation appeared on Fox Footy’s show, Brown discovered that he could no longer stretch the injured finger.
Kayo is your ticket to the Toyota AFL Premiership season 2020. Watch every game every round Live & On-Demand. New to Kayo? Get your 14-day free trial and start streaming immediately
“If you don’t get surgery, it ends,” said Brown, pointing his pinky at a jagged angle – and received a high-profile response from Fox Footy presenter Sarah Jones.
“It should be the other way around.”
When asked by football legend Nick Riewoldt to stretch his finger, Brown replied, “I can’t. That is as far as it goes. I can’t stretch that finger. The problem is that the tendon is broken.
“It’s a pretty ordinary look.”
Brown went on to explain that his tendon injury was on the opposite side of the finger from De Goey’s new injury – meaning that the Collingwood player could stretch his finger but could never completely close the finger again without surgery.
Brown said at the time that he would be on the sidelines for 12 weeks, but instead made the decision to play through the injury and accept the consequences.
“I had a choice. Jordan De Goey has no choice, ”he said.
“If he doesn’t have surgery right away, he won’t be able to properly close his fingers for the rest of his career. You can’t wait until the end of the season and then fix it.
“It happened to (me) in the middle of a game in the first round. So I had the choice, you can have 12 weeks on the sidelines or play through. “
The bad nature of Brown’s long-term injury was clearly faced for Jones and Riewoldt.
“A bit of a no-brainer, though brownie. Give me the surgery. I don’t want to look like that, ”said the St. Kilda champion.
Jones simply replied, “This is disgusting”
Brown has had countless injuries during his 15-year career with the Lions – but the truth about his injured finger was not revealed at that point.
De Goey is expected to miss the rest of the regular season and may also miss some final games for Collingwood after the club announced that it might not be back in action until October.
Brown Fox had previously called Footy from a Melbourne studio when the Bulldogs finished in the top four for the first time this season with a hard victory over the Suns.
Sun star Izak Rankine had a chance to tie the score when the minutes passed at the end of the last quarter after spectacularly overtaking Bailey Williams – but he missed his difficult shot out of his pocket.
The suns had plenty of time to correct the blemish, but the dogs kept the sunless for the past five minutes.
The suns set up camp in their front half, but could not find a target above.
In a desperate final attack in the final minute of the game, the Suns had a final die throw with a long kick into the fifty forward, but was chopped off by Marcus Bontempelli in a good pack mark when no Suns player flew after him.
In the end, the dogs won 7.9 (51) to 6.10 (46) – but they knew they were in a fight.
Rankine made some highlights in his third game, but complained about a wasteful 1.4 in front of the goal.
The defeat cost the suns a place in the top 4 and will likely see them slip out of the top 8 at the end of the round.
.
