The news that Anthony Gardner is out for the rest of the season is utterly heartbreaking for the player, and doesn't do a lot for the hopes of anyone else connected to the club either.
In the last moments of the FA Cup travesty at Arsenal, Gardner was sent forward by Phil Brown as an emergency striker as City sought a last-ditch equaliser. After one mid-air challenge, he slumped to the ground and was led very gingerly from the field for help. He did hobble back on, but as the final whistle sounded, he was on the deck again, stretched out in agony. A week on, we learn that he has suffered four fractured vertebrae, as painful an injury as any footballer could suffer.
Now, Gardner has not been blessed on the injury front in his career. Almost a decade at Tottenham Hotspur was interrupted consistently by knocks and tweaks and pulls and tears, and he never fully established himself, despite such a long period at the club which earned him England honours. Perhaps upon his arrival at the KC in the summer for a record £2.5 million a new door in his frustrating career could be pushed open.
Sadly, after a good start alongside Michael Turner, he suffered the thigh problem which would render him out for the longest two weeks in football history. The months of absence and false alarms finally ended when City travelled to Sheffield United for the FA Cup fifth round tie.
Gardner's return, though overdue, was still well-timed as his replacement, Kamil Zayatte, had started to become something of a liability on the park, albeit not one that earned him major derision. Gardner plays like Zayatte but without the brainstorms - the height above strikers is there, as is the timing in the tackle and the positional sensibility. Fortunately, Gardner does not possess the facility to dive into illegal challenges or lose communication with his team-mates to hand chances on a plate to opponents.
Gardner and Turner, settled and secure, seemed to be a partnership which could reduce the Tigers' leakage at the back and gently clear a path for our survival in the Premier League. With Gardner's appalling news this week, that hope is dashed.
But it's not the last of our woes. Turner was clearly not fully fit at Wigan Athletic and Zayatte hobbled off on the hour, still in pain following a multiple challenge with Sam Ricketts and Charles N'Zogbia which also saw the Frenchman subbed and Ricketts, the only one unhurt, given a caution. Certainly we can, unlike other Premier League teams, be grateful for the international break as these players have two weeks to sort themselves out and Zayatte is being assess by his country's medics as we breathe right now.
One assumes that both will be fit for the visit of Portsmouth on April 4th. If not, or even if just one has to sit it out, then Ricketts will have to perform his capable but inexperienced deputy shtick in the centre again, as he has done briefly before. There are no other specialist central defenders available, with the youthful Liam Cooper - impressive at Swansea City, lest we forget - still rehabilitating from his own bad injury (and chucking a boy in at this stage of a Premier League season would be seriously desperate) while Wayne Brown is unrecallable from his loan at Leicester City and one would have to ask how keen he would be to return in any event, given the tension between player and parent club this season.
We can all wish Gardner a speedy recovery. While the Jimmy Bullard situation hasn't affected the team as he wasn't in it to begin with, the absence of a very sound, capable and calm defender certainly will give us all pause for thought as we go into the next three games - games which are each against sides below us in the table and surely provide our gateway to a Premier League sequel in which Gardner can finally play the full and worthwhile part his ability merits.
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