Sunderland to investigate why they have lost so many players to injury this season

EPL: Steve Bruce, Tottenham – Sunderland (Getty Images)

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Sunderland boss Steve Bruce has revealed the club are to conduct an investigation into why so many players have been sidelined with injuries this season.

The extent of Sunderland’s problems reached crisis point when only 13 first team players were fit enough to train last week, as eight players were forced out with injuries.

The Black Cats have suffered a dramatic dip in form of late and manager Bruce is determined to find answers.

“I’ve been in the game a long, long time and I’ve never known anything like the injury problems we have had this season,” he told The Sunderland Echo. “It’s ridiculous.

“I’ve had meetings with doctors and sports scientists and specialists to try to find answers, because it can’t be a coincidence – we have to ask ourselves if we are doing something fundamentally wrong at the moment to make these injuries happen.

“For four home games in a row to be making substitutions after the first 20 minutes, it’s just crazy.

“So we need to get to the bottom of that and find how we can improve in that direction.

“We’ve had six operations this season alone and we’ve had re-occurences as well. Well have to look at the sports science of things and do everything we can to get it right.

“I’ve been in the game a long time and this number of injuries is not something you usually see. We need to see what we can do to tackle the problem.

“You can’t play the best teams in this league team and expect to get away with fielding only a half-strength side and too often this year that’s exactly what we’ve been doing.

“It’s a crying shame because you can see how useful the likes of Lee Cattermole and Michael Turner are to us as they’re getting fitter. And they’re just two of half-a-dozen first teamers that have missed too much of the season because of injuries.

“Every side gets knocks, of course, but not as many as we’ve had and there’s no doubts in my mind that if we’d kept some of these lads out of the treatment room we’ve be a lot higher up the table.”