Things aren’t easy for Justin Eilers at the moment. While his teammates see of the season in Mallorca, the Braunschweig born man is back in Bremen having had an operation and will now begin his rehabilitation programme.
Things aren’t easy for Justin Eilers at the moment. While his teammates see of the season in Mallorca, the Braunschweig born man is back in Bremen having had an operation and will now begin his rehabilitation programme.
Of course the striker would much rather be with his colleagues in Mallorca, but Justin Eilers must now begin a rehabilitation programme in order to return to fitness. “My heart bleeds. I’m sure the boys are having a lot of fun. But there are more important things for me right now so all holidays need to be postponed,” said Eilers.
Eilers, who suffered tears to his medial collateral ligament and his cruciate ligament, was operated on by Dr. Eichhorn in Bad Griesbach last week. “The operation went really well. Dr. Eichhorn did a brilliant job and I am very grateful to him. It’s idyllic in Bad Griesbach. It wasn’t a bad place to spend a few days,” said Eilers with a smile.
This was definitely Eilers’ hardest year of his career to date. He missed the entire first half of the season with a hip injury and one week ago he suffered another set-back. Things were going well for Eilers: in ten third division matches for the Werder U23s he was directly involved in five goals. He was naturally pleased that Florian Kohlfeldt’s team was able to secure safety last Saturday: “It was exciting until the end and I’m really pleased that the boys managed to stay up,” said Eilers. While he was following the U23s match on the Live-Ticker, Eilers was watching the first team play in the Bundesliga on the TV. “It’s a shame that we didn’t qualify for Europe. The boys played well for large parts of the game. In the end, we were missing a little bit of luck,” reflected Eilers.
Eilers hasn’t had a lot of luck this year, but the striker is refusing to get disheartened. The former Dresden man knows how to overcome the disappointment of an injury. “Of course it’s a horribly bitter feeling, but you have to look for the positive moments during the rehabilitation. When I come to training in the gym without crutches then my motivation will increase again,” said Eilers.
During such periods there are things which can help: “My girlfriend and my family support me a lot. I was also pleased to receive the well wishes from the club.“ Above all, Eilers was touched by the action of the U23s to ‘Eilers 17’ shirts during their warm up. “A nice touch from the boys which really made me happy,” said Eilers.
Now he wants to get to work on his comeback as soon as possible. Werder’s striker has been devising a plan for his rehabilitation for a long time: “I’ll begin my programme here in Bremen and then I’ll spend a couple of weeks training in my hometown, Braunschweig.” Werder’s number 17 will hopefully re-join full training during next season’s winter break.
