The Hull City midfielder Ryan Mason underwent surgery at St Mary’s hospital in London on Sunday night after suffering a fractured skull in a sickening clash of heads with Chelsea’s Gary Cahill during his team’s loss.
The club confirmed Mason, a £12m signing from Tottenham Hotspur last summer, was in a stable condition and is expected to remain in hospital in Paddington over the next few days so his recovery can be closely assessed.
Doctors from both clubs, together with paramedics on site, had treated the 25-year-old on the turf for around nine minutes early in the Premier League match before carefully lifting Mason on to a stretcher. He departed wearing an oxygen mask and in obvious discomfort.
Paramedics rushed him to hospital where he was initially treated at the facility’s acute trauma centre, before undergoing surgery on the skull fracture and a bleed in St Mary’s Neurosurgery Unit. “Everyone at the club would like to express their sincere thanks for the excellent and swift care given to Ryan by both the accident and emergency department and neurosurgery unit at St Mary’s hospital,” said a Hull spokesman. “Ryan is in a stable condition and is expected to remain in hospital for the next few days.”
Mason, standing near the penalty spot, had leapt to repel Pedro Rodriguez’s 12th-minute cross as Hull weathered early Chelsea pressure at Stamford Bridge, only to connect accidentally with Cahill, springing up on his blind side, as the home side’s captain jumped to head the loose ball. “I tried to get on to the cross and we smashed heads,” said Cahill. “It was a massive impact. I wish him all the very best and I hope there’s no serious injury.”
While both players crumpled to the turf, the Hull players immediately started frantically waving for medical assistance from the bench while Tom Huddlestone, closest to the stricken Mason, attempted to comfort his team-mate. The referee, Neil Swarbrick, called on the medics who took their time with the player, who appeared to be conscious as he was carried on the stretcher down the tunnel. Supporters from both clubs, aware of the gravity of the situation, applauded him away with the substitute David Meyler taking his place on the field.
Cahill returned to the pitch upon the resumption of play and went on to score the home side’s second goal, nine minutes from time, despite his manager Antonio Conte having admitted he had doubts over his captain’s own condition at the half-time interval. “First of all, everyone at Chelsea wants to wish [Mason] the best,” said Conte. “It was a bad accident with Gary. After the first half, it wasn’t really good with Gary, but we decided to continue with him. It was very bad, this accident. Everyone at Chelsea hopes to see [Mason] recovered and on the pitch very soon.”
St Mary’s hospital boasts one of London’s top acute trauma centres, specialising in dealing with serious conditions sustained as a result of an accident, sport or violence. Mason’s plight prompted a wave of support on social media after the match, with former team-mates such as Harry Kane, as well as current players at Hull and Chelsea, offering thoughts, prayers and support for the midfielder. The Football Association also sent a message of support for a player who was capped in March 2015 while still on Spurs’ books. He had set up the national team’s equaliser, scored by Andros Townsend, in that friendly against Italy.
Chelsea have relatively recent experience of incidents of serious head trauma after their former goalkeeper, Petr Cech, was seriously injured in a clash with Stephen Hunt only 20 seconds into a Premier League game at Reading in October 2006. The goalkeeper suffered a depressed fracture of the skull in that incident and underwent emergency surgery at the Royal Berkshire hospital before he was treated at the specialist neurosurgical unit at Radcliffe Infirmary in Oxford, where two loose pieces of skull were lifted away from the brain and replaced with metal plates.
Cech was out of action for three months after the operation, returning to the team early in 2007, and has worn a protective head guard in matches ever since.