Serious injury to Silvia Navarro: rupture of the anterior cruciate ligament and the internal meniscus of her left knee

Silvia Navarro, a week ago at the International Tournament of Spain. RFEBM / JL RECIO (RFEBM / JL RECIO)

It looked bad and the diagnosis confirmed it: the goalkeeper and captain of the handball team, Silvia Navarro (Valencia, 43 years old), suffered a rupture of the anterior cruciate ligament and the internal meniscus of her left knee.

In the next few days she will be operated on and her discharge, according to the medical services of the Spanish federation, could be around seven or eight months.

The fatal action occurred near the break of the Guerreras' European debut against Montenegro (30-23 loss).

After a shot by the Balkans, which ended up inside, a bad turn of the knee caused the injury of the goalkeeper, who went straight to the bench, barely supporting his leg, and with gestures of pain that triggered the alarms.

For now, the coach, José Ignacio Prades, decided not to call anyone and continue with Merche Castellanos (Ciudad Real, 34 years old) and Maddi Aalla (Plentzia, Vizcaya, 25 years old).

The former, who has 76 caps on her record and enjoys a more prominent role since last year's World Cup, will carry the weight of the Spanish goal against the latter, who has barely played 11 games for the senior team and is debuting in a great championship (it was one of the discards this Saturday).

Both play in the Spanish league: Castellanos at Costa del Sol in Malaga and Aalla at Bera Bera in San Sebastián.

The news about Silvia Navarro's health deepens the bad feelings of the team after the disappointing match against Montenegro, in which she was outplayed from start to finish, without ideas in attack and with insufficient deployment at the back.

Her next appointments in the European Championship are this Monday against Poland and on Wednesday against Germany (both at 8:30 p.m. and on Teledeporte).

Of the four teams in each group, three go through to the second phase with the points added against the teams that also qualify.

Obtaining this ticket is a minimum objective for the selection.

Lo will have to fight without his main goalkeeper, a pillar still on the court and a benchmark outside, in a locker room with a lot of youth.

Navarro added his 249th match with the Spanish team this Saturday, the fourth in the

after Marta Mangué (301), Cristina Gómez (277) and Carmen Martín (250), who made it public this Friday that she had withdrawn from the team.

The Valencian goal debuted with the absolute in 1998 and since 2010 she has not missed any major tournament between Europeans, World Cups and Games.

In total, she accumulates 16 in a row.

In this period, she has won four of the five medals that the Warriors have achieved in history: Olympic bronze (2012), world bronze (2011), world silver (2019) and European silver (2014).

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