Harrison Afful Ruled Out For Five Weeks With Jaw Injury

Harrison Afful has been ruled out for five weeks after suffering a broken jaw in Columbus crew 2-0 victory over Atlanta United on Saturday.

The experienced right-back who was playing his 100th MLS match collided with teammate and countryman Jonathan Mensah in the 27th minute hence leading to the injury.

"I heard a sound, but you just never know – it’s wet and the ball is hitting sopping wet jerseys so you just don’t know what the sound is,'' Columbus Crew midfielder Will Trapp said.

''So he went down and I thought it was a nose break, which is still serious but not a big deal. To hear that he broke his jaw is just devastating.''

The Ghanaian international was rush to the hospital immediately after the match to detect the extent of the injury.

However, head coach of Columbus Crew, Caleb Poter revealed the extent of the injury and is devasted to miss the quality services of Afful.

''Harry has a fractured jaw. As you know with fractured jaws, they wire your jaw shut, so they’ll have his jaw wired shut for a period of four to five weeks, and then from there, it’ll be a matter of his fitness and nutrition," he said

"You never like to lose a quality player like him from your team, but that’s why we have a squad and it opens up an opportunity for Hector [Jimenez] and we are very confident in Hector and comfortable with him, so we’ll have to manage this four to five weeks and then several weeks after that without Harry."