There has been plenty of criticism of the clubs injury management including the return of Tom Bell after one match with a broken finger which then saw him out again for several weeks. A related criticsm has been made of Bell's level of fitness after coming back from that injury seeming to carry a bit of a gut. The comment has been made that a broken finger doesn't stop you training.

All sounded fair comment to me until I read the attached.

http://www.carltonfc.com.au/news/2014-0 ... continuity

Bell ... fractured a finger in round five against the Western Bulldogs.

Initially, the injury didn't seem a significant setback. After surgery to repair the fracture, Bell missed just one game, returning for the round seven clash with Collingwood.

Bell said he had felt ready to play against Collingwood but in hindsight probably should have given his finger longer to heal.

After that game, Bell's finger became infected and he needed further surgery.

Over the next eight weeks, Bell had several other surgeries – he can't remember whether he had four or five operations on the finger all up – during which time he was unable to run.

"It's been pretty challenging. I think I ended up having four or five surgeries on the finger, which got infected," Bell said.

"So I couldn't really sweat in that time, which meant I lost a bit of fitness.

Make sense when you think about it - perhaps I and others owe both the medicos and Tom himself an apology.

Yeah......nah!

Why'd they let him play when he wasn't ready, probably wouldn't have got infected!!!!!!

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"I will rejoice in their anguish, delight in their failure and revel in our success"

We are Carlton, @#$%&! the rest !!!!!!

Anyone who said he could still run whilst he had an infection in his finger is clearly ignorant.

Can't remember how many operations he had?

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"Who discovered we could get milk from cows, and what did he think he was doing at the time?" Billy Connolly

Why does this need its own thread? Bell has one in Talking Players.

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Let slip the Blues of war (with apologies to William Shakespeare) (and Sir Francis Bacon, just in case)

Because it also relates to the general question of injury management and jumping to conclusions. That was my thought, anyway.