Our clinic is open with experts providing both online and face-to-face appointments. Book Online Now
As we witnessed in Andy Murray’s gruelling fight to victory at Wimbledon, tennis puts a huge amount of strain on the body and you don’t need to be Andy Murray to feel the effects of this strain. Tennis injuries are very common and that’s why at Octopus Clinic we are highly experienced in treating tennis related injuries and pain.
Here are four of the most common injuries tennis players face and how to overcome them. Make sure you get all injuries fully assessed and treated before taking on board any of the following advice or doing any of the exercises.
This is an irritation of the tendon that runs over the bony bit of the elbow. The pain comes on slowly often after tennis at first, then during the game and when lifting and twisting, like pouring from a kettle or opening a heavy door. It is caused in particular by the movement required to create top spin. To treat it properly the stability of the shoulder needs to be addressed. If the shoulder is moving inefficiently more strain is exerted on the elbow. Treatment should therefore never focus purely on the elbow itself.
An insight into treatment…
Ankle injuries have been particularly prevalent on the slippery surfaces of Wimbledon this year. The risk of ankle injuries, which can range from ankle ligament sprains, ankle impingement, tendon problems and even fractures; can be reduced by training the stability muscles of the ankle and leg and improving proprioception. Proprioception is the body’s positional sense, i.e. how you can control the position of your arms and legs without having to look at them.
An insight into treatment…
Back injuries can destroy any tennis players’ game whether you are social player or a world champion like Andy Murray. Common back injuries are muscle strains, facet joint injuries or damage to the intervertebral discs. Disc injuries include prolapses, which can irritate the nerves coming out the spine and at worse the spinal cord and therefore must be diagnosed and treated properly by your physiotherapist. Please click on the link to learn more about the spine and back pain.
An insight into treatment…
Far too many people suffer in silence with shoulder aches, pains and injuries. The vast majority fall under the umbrella of shoulder impingement and this is fully treatable with the right physiotherapy. The absolute key to treatment is to get the shoulder working efficiently in the positions required of it to play tennis. It might sound obvious, but if you are only working your shoulder muscles with your arm by your side, there is not going to be sufficient carry over into a tennis swing and certainly not an overhead swing. Therefore your Physiotherapist will need to design exercises that safely rehabilitate your shoulder with your arm moving through the motions required to play tennis.
An insight into treatment…
Remember, you must have your injury or pain fully assessed and treated by an experienced physiotherapist or osteopath.
Clicking or crunching in the neck can be caused by a number of things. Most people fear that the clicking is caused by bone hitting bone. However, thankfully nowadays this is rare. If you have this it is likely that for many years you have been suffering severe pain and...
Read MoreCervical disc problems include degeneration, disc bulges or disc prolapses.If the discs in the neck become damaged they can bulge out and irritate or pinch the nerves coming out of the neck or the spinal cord itself. This clearly has serious implications, however can often be treated successfully with physiotherapy...
Read MoreThis is an irritation of the tendon that runs over the bony bit of the elbow. The pain comes on slowly often after the aggravating activity at first. As it becomes more severe the pain then starts to be experienced during the aggravating activity. The aggravating activities include tennis, squash...
Read MorePatello-femoral pain syndrome is sometimes referred to as Anterior knee Pain. Anterior is the medical word for the front of, which is why the term anterior knee pain in itself is not a diagnosis. It is in fact an umbrella term that covers a number of diagnoses, one of which...
Read MoreThe thoracic spine – middle and upper part of the back - is the stiffest part of the spine due to the ribs attaching here, but it commonly becomes too stiff as a result of poor postures. Please click here to learn correct sitting posture. Thoracic spine stiffness puts more...
Read MoreThis is very similar to tennis elbow except that it affects the other side of the elbow. The pathology and treatment are very similar, just directed at these tendons rather than the ones involved in tennis.
Read MoreThere are a variety of exercises that are great for your feet and ankles including: 1) Foot self-massage exercise 2) Eccentric calf strengthening 3) Foot muscles strengthening 4) Concentric calf strength and ankle instability exercise
Read MorePlease click here to read 'how the knee works' before reading the following. This exercise trains the lateral glute muscle fibres, lower limb alignment, VMO (the inside part of the quads muscle) and stretches the calf so is a big hitter – if you can get it right! You will...
Read MorePlease click here to read how the knee works before reading the following.
Read MorePlease click here to read how the foot and ankle works and click here to read Achilles pain before reading the following. Make sure you have your heel pain diagnosed properly by a physio, osteo or sport doctor to ensure that heel drops are appropriate. There are some types of...
Read MoreThe following advice is designed for you to work through with your physiotherapist so it is important that you DO NOT try and do it alone. Hence why there is some juicy physiotherapy lingo in there!
Read MorePlease click here to read how the shoulder works before reading the following. The lats are often tight and over active relative to the smaller shoulder muscles like the rotator cuff muscles.
Read MoreAs a physiotherapist, I get lots of questions online and...
This exercise can be brilliant for hip and groin pain...
Get rid of your neck pain and headaches with exercises...
As a physiotherapist this is probably the most common question I get...
Hover over the specific body parts and find out more
Use your mouse to hover over the dark grey dots and click through to the specific body parts to get advice about your injury.
We promise to never share your email address with anyone.