Andros Townsend's Narrow Escape from a Pitch Roller Accident
Andros Townsend has lived through some heavy tackles in his career. This one came from a pitch roller.
The 35-year-old PT Prachuap forward was almost seriously injured in a freak accident before an away game in Pattani in Thai League 1, when a member of staff appeared to lose control of a heavy roller that then ran over the lower left side of his body.
He escaped with cuts and bruises. No broken bones. And he still played, coming on late in a 3-0 win.
‘Every time I watch it, it sends shivers down my spine’
Speaking on the programme "Football Uncensored", the former Premier League winger admitted the footage still unsettles him.
"Every time I watch it, it sends shivers down my spine. I can hardly believe it. It's terrible to watch it again and realise what could have happened."
His reaction, a split-second dive to the turf, saved him from something far worse.
"Luckily, I was fortunate enough to manage to throw myself to the ground at exactly the right moment, so that nothing was broken when the roller went over me."
Townsend had actually clocked the roller earlier, before the warm-up even started.
"I remember thinking: I've never seen that in my career before, what are they doing? But we were called out for the warm-up. I didn't think anything more of it," he said.
"The next time I saw it, I was literally underneath it. Fortunately, there were no serious injuries. A few bumps and bruises, but I got away unscathed."
A body with history, a near miss with disaster
For most players, the shock would have been bad enough. For Townsend, with his injury record, the alarm was instant.
The 13-cap England international has carried the scars of a long career in the Premier League with Tottenham Hotspur, Crystal Palace and Luton Town among his clubs. Serious injuries kept interrupting that journey, and his left side has been through the wars in particular.
His left knee and left ankle have both required operations. As the roller came down, those old wounds were all he could think about.
"I thought either my left ankle was going to break or my left knee. I thought I was done for. I was very lucky that I was able to limp away from it and recover within a few minutes," he said.
On the grass, pinned by a piece of machinery that had no business being that close to players, Townsend was still fighting.
"It (the roller) was pretty heavy, but I somehow managed to lift it and push it away from me. When it was then completely on top of me, I was getting a little crushed. I was able to lift my left arm and relieve some pressure that way. Then I managed to gather my team-mates around me, who were able to lift the roller, and I could wriggle out. But at the moment it crushed my left leg, I have to say, it was pretty frightening."
‘Go to the doctor’ – but Townsend plays on
His team-mates urged him to stop the warm-up and get checked immediately. Townsend ignored them.
"My team-mates were very surprised that I carried on with the warm-up. They told me to go to the doctor," he recalled.
He stayed out there, finished the session and later featured in the match. The club does not expect the incident to affect his move to Southeast Asia or the remainder of his career. As Townsend put it, the accident will "definitely not stop him from carrying on".
Soon after, he did what many modern players do when something wild happens: he went to Instagram.
Earlier in the season he had joked about the state of some Thai pitches, comparing away days to the famously unforgiving conditions at Stoke City's Bet365 Stadium. After nearly being flattened by a roller, he returned to that theme with a new punchline.
"Away at Stoke wasn't that bad after all," he wrote.
For a player who has rebuilt his career more than once, surviving a runaway pitch roller in Thailand is just the latest twist. The question now is simple: after cheating this kind of fate, how far can he push this unexpected late chapter?
