Footballer has career ended through horror head injury

A non-league footballer has had his career ended after just ONE game for his new club after a freak incident left him with life-threatening facial injuries.

Jack Wheat, a 23-year-old goalkeeper, signed for Goole AFC on Friday March 11 to play the following day after injuries to their first and second choice shot stoppers.

The match was against Market Drayton Town in the Evo-Stik League First Division South, and he was called into action after 15 minutes.

A seemingly innocuous challenge left him with fractures to his eye socket, cheekbones, skull and jaw.

However, Wheat insists he didn't think anything was seriously wrong, just that he had a 'big cut' around his eye, and revealed the opposition even scored during the melee.

He also says he remembers everything and was never concussed.

“It was only when I got in the changing room that I started touching my face and there was nothing there," he told The Sun. "The bones and curves of my face were just flat. That’s when I knew there was something wrong.

“The doctors at the hospital were asking me if I had been assaulted because they said they were the worst facial fractures they had ever seen.

“Being told by the doctors how dangerous it would be for me to risk playing again, I have to stop which is heart-breaking because it’s all I have ever done and I love it. But I can’t take the risk of ever getting any impact on it.