Important: please read the medical dislaimer before continuing to read this section

Risk of injury is inherent to sport.  Injuries can cause set backs in training, missing of important events and, in extreme cases, an end to the player's playing career.  An entire industry has been built around treatment of injury with many private practitioners and practitioners in the employment of sporting bodies.  But to what extent is treatment evidence based? What is effective, what is safe?  This section begins with foundation principles of injury - their causes, the body's reaction and possible treatments.  Later we shall be adding injury specific information.