Mike Tindall, the husband of Zara Tindall, is 43 years old and retired from playing rugby in 2014. However, before to his retirement, he was sidelined by a number of catastrophic injuries, including one that had the potential to take his life.
During his playing career, the former athlete and I’m a Celebrity star was a member of both the Bath and Gloucester rugby teams. In 2008, he suffered an injury while playing in a Six Nations tournament against Wales.
A tackle caused him to suffer a dislocated rib, which was followed by a puncture to his lung and a tear in his liver.
After the event, Mike spent three nights in intensive care after which he provided the following explanation to The Daily Mail: “If the boot had struck me a couple of inches higher or lower, then I would have only broken a couple of ribs rather than all of them.
“That is not very pleasant, and I would have been out of rugby for a few weeks, but I would have settled for that in light of what actually occurred instead,” the player said. “What occurred instead was far more unfortunate.”
He revealed that his adversary’s boot had struck him in the sternum and diaphragm, while the studs had penetrated his liver.
“At first, I believed that I had only injured my ribs, albeit in a significant way. The first thing that came to my mind was that at least a handful of them were broken. The fact that I was having such a hard time breathing, however, was the primary source of my concern “Mike thought back on it.
“At the time, I didn’t gauge how critical a situation I was in,” he added. “I didn’t know how bad my health was.” “It was discovered that I had a significant tear in my liver. It had a width of almost an inch and a depth of approximately an inch.
“The most significant cause for concern was the bleeding inside of me. I had a two-pint loss of blood into my membrane, and if any more of it had spilled out and gotten mixed up in my stomach, I would have been in serious trouble.”
After a period of time, Mike was eventually able to make a full recovery from his injury. During that time, he was there for his then-girlfriend Zara as she prepared for an eventing competition in Portugal.
