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Loons lose versatile Hassani Dotson to a torn ACL

Andy Greder, Pioneer Press
·2 min read
Loons lose versatile Hassani Dotson to a torn ACL

Hassani Dotson, Minnesota United’s Mr. Versatility, has a torn anterior cruciate ligament in his right knee and will miss the final 27 games of the 2022 regular season, the club announced Saturday.

Dotson, who had played all 630 minutes across seven games this season, was injured during a training session Friday. The Washington State native, who received a new contract and a salary raise before this season, went down during a transfer drill on artificial field-turf at the National Sports Center in Blaine and had medical staff address him immediately.

Manager Adrian Heath hoped post-training that Dotson’s injury was just some swelling from getting his foot caught in the field, but one of the worst-case diagnoses was soon realized.

This is a further blow to a Loons’ backline, which has been in flux since the season started in late February. They have started the same group of four in consecutive games twice. Dotson, who was projected to be a starting midfielder alongside Wil Trapp, has started four games at right back and three at his preferred spot in midfield.

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No. 1 right back Romain Metanire, 32, has been sidelined all by 22 minutes this season with nagging hamstring injuries that has lingered from the MLS Cup Playoffs in November.

Veteran fullback Oniel Fisher will step in at right back on Saturday vs. Chicago Fire.

D.J. Taylor will also be a candidate to fill in for Dotson and until Metanire is healthy, which is expected to be weeks longer. Fisher, a seven-year MLS veteran, has played 203 minutes for Minnesota, and Taylor, in his second year in MLS, has seen 222 minutes this season.

The loss of Dotson doesn’t affect the midfield as much as it will the back line, with Trapp, the club’s captain, remaining in the middle and with the emergence of Kervin Arriaga and Joseph Rosales. The latter pair of Hondurans are expected to have a more direct opportunity to play.

The Loons have had rashes of injuries during training sessions in the last few years, and they fired Damian Roden, the club’s senior director of sports science, last September to help address this.

Dotson’s injury Friday came on a transfer drill, where three small groups of players work move the ball in possession across a few zones. This is also a routine pregame warmup. In order to play soccer, you have to practice it.

The easiest place to second guess this injury, if there is one, is the location of the practice: indoors at the sports hall at the National Sports Center instead of outside on their two grass fields. MNUFC was believed to be last MLS team to train outside as of mid-April, but have had the opportunity for more than week, including the day before their U.S. Open Cup match Wednesday. Granted, Friday’s weather was blustery and cooler with sporadic rain.

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