Stephan Nachtigall has been working for his comeback for months. Now the former Rot-Weiss Essen player is once again slowed down by an injury.

What bad luck for Stephan Nachtigall. After the former Rot-Weiss Essen professional suffered a knee injury last year, the 37-year-old was on the verge of returning to the football pitch. Now there was the next setback.

In December 2021, Nachtigall underwent knee surgery for cartilage damage. Seven tough months later, he was back on the pitch for the first time. Still without the ball, of course, “but I was already hot as fritters again.”

The plan was for him to return to full fitness at the beginning of August with the district league team Vogelheimer SV. The ex-RWE player had already taken part in three training sessions. The injury then occurred outside of team training, of all places – privately with his son.

Injury during father-son training

This one is active in the U10 of Schalke 04. In order to stay fit in the summer, father and son completed athletics training together. For half an hour this went without a hitch, then came the moment of shock for Nachtigall Senior. “All of a sudden there was a crack, as if someone had cracked a whip on my back”. It was immediately clear that the Achilles tendon had ruptured.

“I then immediately googled how long I would have a break,” Nachtigall was initially shocked by the predicted six to nine months of downtime. “The knee injury had just been more or less overcome and then the next story comes straight away.” But after a torn meniscus, a damaged cruciate ligament and the aforementioned cartilage damage, even this injury should not mean the end of his active time.

Now I have to start from scratch again, but everyone who knows me knows that I will give 110 per cent to be back on the pitch in January.

Stephan Nachtigall

“Now I have to start from scratch again, but everyone who knows me knows that I will give 110 per cent again to be back on the pitch in January,” the captain of the district league team is combative. “I had surgery on 13 July and from 14 July onwards I was on the pitch every training session with the team and doing my strength training,” he said, wanting to support the team with his presence.

As an active part of the starting eleven, however, the veteran will be missing from Vogelheimer SV for at least the entire first half of the season. The season in the district league starts in a fortnight. He would then like to be back in the team for winter preparation for the second half of the season.