Occurrence of knee injuries in the practice of Soccer.

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       Soccer is a sport that for its variety of movements and the dispute in moves in search of victories, being professionally or not, leads to a concern to reduce the risks every day (BRITO et al., 2009).

       Although not in general terms, the lesion with increased occurrence, the knee injury is the most serious in soccer players (HAGGLUND et al., 2005), with greater emphasis on the injuries to the anterior cruciate ligament (ACL), and this sometimes responsible for the early withdrawal of athletes career due to functional limitations from injury (SOARES, 2007).

      Due to the different game situations and training methodologies, several possibilities of knee injuries are existing in soccer, having a severity level of variability, which are classified according to the number of days out of the activities, which are: light (1 -3 days absent), minor (3-6 days), moderate (7-28 days), major and severe (more than 28 days) (SOARES, 2007).

      Some researchers tried to analyze the incidence of injuries in soccer, where Hagglung et al. (2003) reported that 3 to 4 players each have an injury a year which limits its performance temporarily. Junge and Dvorak (2004) also highlight that injuries occur up to six times during matches compared to training.

     The medical department of the Barcelona researched the incidence of injury in his players over three seasons and also reported higher incidence of injuries in games compared to training and most of them were pubic or knee injury.

      The movements in playing soccer as displacements, jumps, sprints, kicks and divided associated with footwear with locks that change the grip on the road, cause many injuries in the knee joint increases the risk of joint damage (MASSADA, 2000).

    Fuller et al. (2006) reported that most side meniscus and ligament injuries are of a side impact, such friction is considered largely responsible for injuries in this sport. However, despite these findings, the rules of the sport will give greater punishment faults behind and not to lateral faults, which stimulates greater lateral friction and consequently greater risk of injury to matches.

ACL injuries in Soccer

    The anterior cruciate ligament injury occurs when required surgery and general practitioner or player removes the fields for about 4 months or more (ROI et al., 2006).

     The ACL reconstruction require much care, made perfect way allows the athlete to return to activity without limitation, otherwise, may lead to early career finish (Soares, 2007)

    The recovery period of ACL injuries is controversial in the literature, usually ranging from 4 to 6 months between surgery and the return to the practice sports. Survey of athletes Serie highlighted that 10% of athletes have had cruciate ligament injury at some point in their career.

    The ACL injuries are due to excessive overload of such a joint, resulting from an abnormal movement of the tibio-femoral joint which causes failure in the stabilization mechanisms, leading to the partial or total breakage (HUGHES and WATKINS, 2004).