There some a few things you don't want to become in your life, and one of them is a statistic. Particularly if it's a statistic you fear and it's a World Cup year.

I've rabbitted on previously about how women are eight times more likely to do their knees than men and 25 per cent more like to re-do them. I have a sneaky feeling I'm about to join those ranks.

Of course, you aren't a statistic until a doctor's confirmed the diagnosis, and a doctor can't confirm the diagnosis until you've had an MRI. So, my high-in-denial, utterly irrational thinking about this says don't go to the doctor and whatever you do, don't let them strap you into The Magnet.

But unrelenting pain and knee-joint instability cut through even the best denial and painkillers and, after consulting with Doctor Google, I'm pretty sure I've at least partially torn my medial meniscus. FML and FMFC (Eff My Footballing Career).

Adding insult to injury? The way I did it.

Playing knee-unfriendly netball and football meant that an injury was always in the back of my mind and at the front of my nightmares. I figured if or when I did a knee, it would be in a crunching, body-on-the-line, hero tackle where I saved my team from a certain goal. Not, as I'm almost too ashamed to write, running unimpeded in a straight line.

My knee was probably already injured and the running just happened to be the moment it gave out. At least, that's my story and I'm sticking to it. FMFK (Eff My Fricking Knee).

But with knees being fairly integral to all sporting (or normal functioning) aspects of one's life, I'm wondering whether this is the beginning of the end, as it were. Will I ever come back from this fully?

Pondering this, I've had such random gems whizzing with my mind:

  • I don't want to become a girly statistic.
  • Maybe it's not so bad. Maybe I'm just being a pansy.
  • If I just ice the bejeepers out of it before I play, it'll be so numb I won't feel the pain; ergo, I'm good to go.
  • Maybe meniscal tears heal themselves.
  • Surely I can just strap the bollocks out of my knee will take the load off the meniscus.
  • Physios fly under the radar-they present as friendly critters who are there to help you. Then they hurt you badly.
  • Technically speaking, my physio didn't explicitly say I couldn't keep playing until they work out what's wrong with me; second ergo, I'm good to go.
  • Why is it that deep-tissue massage on your calves or ITB makes you prone to punching someone and so very, very angry?
  • MRIs are a fate worse than death for claustrophobes like me. They want to do an MRI, they'll have to sedate me (no, really).
  • Evolution, God, and whoever and whatever in between have a lot to answer for with knees. Whose idea was it anyway to design a key, load-bearing body part so unidirectional and flimsy?

Worst of all? I've gammied my knee in a World Cup year. It's not as though I'll be missing out on my call up for the Westfield Matildas. I'm pretty sure three camps and 31 players, not to mention the rest of the players who fill the ranks of the Westfield W-League and then pretty much every other female footballer in the country are in line before me.

But I've already been bitten by the that-could-be-me bug that we all get every major sporting event. You know, where we watch the [insert sportspeople of choice here] on TV making it look heroic and easy as they achieve World Cup/gold-winning glory and we're all inspired to get up off the couch and get out and play.

I get that badly enough during the men's World Cup. The Women's World Cup? The event played out between players who share the same chromosomal make-up as me? The event I could possibly compete in if I were taller, strong, fitter, and more talented? Yeah, that one. This is going to be painful. And I'm not just talking about my knee.

Fiona Crawford is the online/content editor for Girls FC [http://www.facebook.com/girlsfc]. She would like Tom Sermanni, if he's reading this, to know that her knee isn't that bad and she is still available for a Westfield Matilda call up.