Real Madrid fans should be very happy by the announcement from the club that they have reached a ‘mutual agreement’ to part with head club doctor, Jesus Olmo.
Club doctors are never supposed to draw a lot of attention to themselves. The exception was in the Spanish capital with the head of the Real Madrid Sanitas Medical Services, Jesus Olmo. The doctor was considered by many to be controversial and not the best for the job on more than one occasion.
Now, he and his second in command, Mikel Aramberri, have agreed to leave Los Blancos after four years, as the club and the two doctors reached an agreement to part ways.
Olmo was called into question especially during the 2015/2016 season due to the high amount of muscle related injuries suffered by key players in the squad, such as Sergio Ramos, Cristiano Ronaldo, and Gareth Bale.
The always critical Spanish media was all over Olmo and the way he went about his job, especially in October of 2015 when both Marca and AS both came out claiming that the medical staff was causing the players unhappiness in the way they approached treating injuries.
According to Marca, a team vote was held back in the fall of ’15 with many of the players voting to have the head doctor removed from the club after incorrectly treating Gareth Bale’s back injury.
Sergio Ramos publicly spoke out against the staff’s practices a month later, claiming that he was only given injections to help heal a separated shoulder. “The shoulder is not so good. I fell supporting myself while scoring the goal. The important thing is to recover, and I’ll have a scan on Tuesday. I have played four or five games recently with an injection.”
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“When you have a recurrence of the injury it is hard to take. I try to help the team, and now I see the risk, and the value in recovering completely.”
During this tough time in Madrid’s history, nearly a dozen players suffered from muscle strains or tears, with such players as James Rodriguez, Gareth Bale, Karim Benzema, Luka Modric, Pepe, Keylor Navas and Mateo Kovacic all going down with injuries over the course of a couple weeks.
Ramos went on to say, “Now isn’t the best time to talk of medical matters. We have to help each other out to be in the best possible shape at the end of the season. When the time comes to talk about our problems, those of us who are better placed to talk, will.”
Although this season saw a much better fitness level from the team with far less muscle related injuries, the past could not be overlooked and it’s clear that President Florentino Perez was ready to look elsewhere in terms of finding a quality medical staff.
MARCA: Real Madrid are to overhaul their first-team medical staff, with chief doctor Jesus Olmo among those to leave.
— M•A•J (@UltraSuristic_) July 3, 2017
PRAISE THY LORD! pic.twitter.com/nkJZvDAZzh
Real Madrid has been partnered with Sanitas since 2008, and are set to stay with the medical through this season. Howeve, judging by the reception of the fans and players of the doctors the group has provided, those ties could also be severed next summer.
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