KUKoon Saku Vesterinen’s league season ended last autumn with a serious injury.
Saku Vesterinen had 11 league matches last season. Vesa Pöppönen / AOP
- The blade of the opponent’s skate incised a deep wound in Vesterinen’s wrist and severed the artery, six tendons and elbow nerve.
- Vesterinen hopes to be able to return to the league ice next fall.
The Pelicans-KooKoo match missed last October 8th Saku Vesterisen the last of the first league season.
He was tackling to detach the Pelicans striker Elias Vilénin quantity. As the players crashed into the ice, the harmless situation quickly became dramatic.
The opponent’s skate remained upright under Vesterinen’s hand, and the blade slit open his left wrist.
The artery and six tendons broke, as did the elbow nerve.
– I saw a lot of blood coming now. The wrist kind of pulsates in it. There are no memories of the ice after that. That’s how much I went into shock, Vesterinen told Iltalehti last autumn.
The deep wound caused a lot of blood loss. Vesterinen remained conscious, but his survival was in the hands of others.
The home team Pelicans doctor and physiotherapist rushed to the rescue and stopped the bleeding with hemostatic powder.
Vesterinen was rushed to the hospital in an ambulance, but a month after the operation, he was unable to move the fingers of the injured hand. It was clear that his entire playing career was at stake.
Vesterinen showed thumbs up at the hospital last October after a manual operation. Saku Vesterinen’s album
It is now eight months since the accident, and Vesterinen is happy to say: KooKoo has exercised the option in his contract for the period 2022–2023.
– It’s not quite right here yet, he reminds me.
– You can already do everyday things with your hand, but a few fingers lack sensation and the forces have not yet returned. Nerve recovery takes time.
So far, the defender has only visited alone.
– The hand gets tired so fast that it can’t be in the tube for very long.
– I still can’t do a pound in the same way as the others, but otherwise I can train and be involved in almost everything.
Thanks to KooKoo
Exercising the option means that, like Vesterinen, the club management believes in his rehabilitation.
– Everyone thinks the same way that my career will continue. It does not end with such a single injury.
However, there is no certainty when the 23-year-old KalPan breeder will be fit again.
– No one has been able to make a prediction – still. It’s a little frustrating, of course, but it aims to be able to play at some point in the fall.
Vesterinen thanks KooKoo for his attitude to the situation. It did not leave the man on the hill.
– At the beginning, of course, I wondered how this would happen. It feels really good now that that option was exercised and I’m not left empty-handed. The appreciation will rise to the next point.