Young defender Alice Sombath was stretchered off in her first league start in the North London Derby last weekend. The club has now confirmed what we all feared, that Alice had torn her ACL.
This is terrible news for Alice. She’ll miss the rest of her debut season in England and probably next summer’s World Cup, too. There’s plenty of recent history of young players recovering well from ACL injuries, but that hardly feels worth mentioning when Alice still has such a long road ahead of her.
It’s also not great for the club. Alice’s absence leaves us thin at centerback with Clare Hunt still sidelined and no word on her recovery timeline. Amanda Nildén and Caitlin Dijkstra both have the ability to partner Tōko Koga at centerback, but we have plenty of evidence that this doesn’t always work. Alice should have been the answer here. She joined the club this summer from Lyon amidst a huge amount of excitement. She’s our record signing, which says something about how highly she’s rated, and the position the club expected her to fill. Now we won’t see that until at least next year.
In the meantime, we’re wishing Alice strength in her recovery, and sending her all our best.