Gini Wijnaldum close to embarrassing on pitch accident

Following on from a few days of illness, Gini Wijnaldum was close to an embarrassing accident on the Anfild pitch during Saturday’s Premier League match against Bournemouth.

It was almost the moment Gary Lineker has waited a long, long 29 years for. Yes, Wijnaldum was close to providing the former England striker a chance to deflect the attention away from his own much publicized, err, public bowel movement at Italia ’90.

As many will already know, there was serious doubt that Wijnaldum would be fit enough to play against the Cherries last weekend. On top of a niggling knee injury, he appeared to have also picked up a stomach bug.

Speaking to The Liverpool Echo, the midfielder explained that initially he thought his stomach issues were a result of a tablet given to him by the club doctor to help his knee. He was told he could expect stomach pains as a side effect.

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"“I took it and I had a pain and thought it was from the tablet. In the end I was vomiting and everyone was a little bit scared.“I didn’t train on Friday and I didn’t sleep at the hotel either because they thought I might infect other players.”"

It later transpired that Wijnaldum had in fact picked up some form of illness that was completely separate to the pain relieving tablet. It was serious enough for him to be banished from the club hotel in order to minimize the chance of passing anything on to his teammates.

Like the trooper he is, the Dutchman rallied and decided he was fit enough to get through the game and do a job for his teammates. He put in another stellar performance and few would have known that he had any issues.

However, the player himself spilled the beans with The Liverpool Echo post match and highlighted just how close he came to putting on a whole different kind of show:

"“In the morning I was still weak and had diarrhea I must say the tablets helped a lot.“But even at half-time I had to run off to get to the toilet. I was like, ‘Oh no!’. I ran inside and I managed to control it!”"

Yikes. Most of us have had a run in with stomach flu at some point. Thankfully, we don’t have the added stress of performing at the highest level of professional football while millions watch on to see any potential “accident”.

Well played, Gini. We hope you feel better!