Why Maboe’s Sundowns mate ‘Vila’ told him the truth

About a year ago, things looked bleak for Lebohang Maboe when he suffered an anterior cruciate ligament injury (ACL) that was meant to keep him out for the entire season, but he managed to recover in time to contribute towards Mamelodi Sundowns’ treble.

Maboe has gone through so much hardship in recovering from his injury and he reveals how he got through the dark time where he feared for his career.

“It was a very tough season with a lot of emotion because I got an injury at the start of the season and I really did not take that well but I told myself that for me to get better and give myself an opportunity to come back In just had to eliminate the outcomes and focus on the process of getting better,” he said.  

“My injury was serious, it was career threatening but I told myself that I just needed to make peace with what happened. I tore my ACL and a bit of my meniscus.

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“I never knew what it really meant when people say ‘take it one day at a time’ until I got injured. There were days when you felt like you just wanted to do more but the knee would not allow that because there were days where it would be responding well and you wake up the next day you can’t even stretch.

“It was mentally draining and difficult to always keep myself sane and be in the right space,” he added.

He describes the seven months as one of the hardest periods of his life and being a semi-introverted person, to some extent, he could not speak about the pain that he felt and instead of crying himself to sleep, he found solace in pen and paper.

“I journaled a lot and it helped me because I sometimes struggle to express my feelings to the next person. It is a lonely journey and you can’t share what you’re feeling with anyone else. You can try explaining but no one feels what you’re feeling and they can only try to comfort you at most,” he said.

Maboe credits his girlfriend and family for giving him all the support he needed, but cannot help but take a swipe at the so-called friends who he expected much from.

“Through such injuries you really get to see who the real ones are because you have a couple of friends who will stick with you but wait until you get injured and you will see who the real ones are. 

“Going into surgery, I had a brief talk with Sibusiso Vilakazi because he also had the same injury and had more injuries than me. He is one person who I used to talk to and he would tell me that it was going to be hard. He did not lie to me, he told me exactly how it was,” said Maboe.