When Brazilian goalkeeper Jakson Follmann took his first steps since surviving a plane crash that wiped out his football club, he called it a win — in his hardest ever season just starting
Brazilian football team Chapecoense's ex-goalkeeper Jakson Follmann during a rehab session at a clinic in Sao Paulo on Saturday. Pic/AFP
Sao Paolo: When Brazilian goalkeeper Jakson Follmann took his first steps since surviving a plane crash that wiped out his football club, he called it a win — in his hardest ever season just starting.
Follmann was the reserve goalie of Chapecoense, a lowly club that had fought its way to the final of the regional Copa Sudamericana regional tournament. Then, on November 28, almost the whole team was wiped out when the plane flying its players to Medellin, Colombia, for the big game, crashed.
Seventy one people died, including the star first choice goalkeeper Danilo. Follmann (24) lost his right leg, but was one of six miraculous survivors. Now he is drawing on all his competitive spirit and discipline to rebuild his life. "My main desire now is to be able to stand up, to walk," he told AFP at the rehab center, where he is learning to walk with a prosthetic leg.
Almost three months after the accident, he’s taken his first unaided steps. "I want to be able to go alone to the bathroom, to brush my teeth. Simple things that people barely notice usually," he said.
Follmann may be up again, but after several operations and 56 days in hospital, every step is filled with pain.
Besides losing his right leg below the knee, his left ankle was badly injured, he broke several bones and needed a spine operation. But he doesn’t consider himself an ex-athlete.
"I see myself as even more of an athlete than before," he said with a laugh. In future, he might just turn to Paralympic sports. "Trying out wheelchair volleyball made me think that limitations are all in your head," he said.
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