Medical man prepares for busy time

8:40am Tuesday 2nd December 2008

IF Gary Megson gets his way and boosts his squad with a raft of new players during next month’s transfer window – one man in particular will have his work cut out.

When a potential new signing walks through the door at the Reebok, it is the job of Dr Jonathan Tobin to decide whether he is up to the task.

And as football clubs have developed a reputation for last-minute bargaining before the midnight deadline on January 31, that duty can often be a high-pressured one.

“We’d all love medicals to be nice, comfortable affairs but they very rarely happen that way,” said the former Preston North End medical man, who joined Wanderers in the summer.

“In the ideal one, there is a lot of detail to do with their past medical history, what injuries they have had in the past and might still have.

“Myself and Nick Worth examine them top to bottom – from the eyes and ears down to every joint and muscles.

“There is a series of blood tests and then we take scans of any parts of the body that we may have concerns about. For example, if someone had a knee injury four years ago you would scan it to see what state it is in now.

“But the ideal medicals never happen. The player is usually flying in at 11pm and needs to be signed by 1am when the transfer window shuts. It can be quite an ordeal.”

Tobin started in football after working as a GP, moving up to Preston four years ago to be closer to his girlfriend.

But it was a chance encounter with North End’s club doctor that set him on the road which eventually led to the Reebok.

“I fell into it really,” Tobin said. “I went out for a meal and found myself sitting next to North End’s club doctor.

“We got chatting and he asked if I would like to come to the club and work as his assistant.

“He was ready to retire and said that when he eventually decided to go, he’d just stop coming down to Deepdale and no one would notice the change. That’s pretty much how it happened.”

Tobin had no second thoughts about leaving his part-time role with Preston, and quitting his job as a local GP, after getting the call from Gary Megson in the summer as part of his restructuring of the club’s medical staff.

“Bolton was an opportunity I couldn’t turn down,” he said.

“They are leagues ahead of even most Premier League clubs in terms of their medical department.

“I was also part-time at Preston and this gave me a chance to really get my teeth into the role and work a lot closer with the players.

“Bolton’s medical department is renowned throughout football as being cutting edge and when I came here, the facilities they have got are second to none.

“The whole ethos of the place is to drive things forward and to be at the forefront of medical care for football players – and that goes right the way through to the coaches and the fitness staff as well.”

Tobin’s role at the Reebok doesn’t just involve screening incoming players for potential injury.

He works closely alongside the current squad to help rehabilitate and assess and potential injuries or weaknesses in a weekly ‘pre-hab’ clinic at Euxton.

“The first part of my role is pretty much acting as a GP for the players,” explained Tobin.

“Often, I’ll get phone calls about their wives or children and deal with coughs, colds and those sorts of illnesses.

“The second is taking an active role in the players’ overall medical care – things like immunisations, vaccinations, blood tests, screenings.

“Thirdly, you provide cover on a match day should there be a serious incident, something like a back trauma, head or neck injury.

“I work closely with the rest of the medical staff, who do a great job here. I offer a slightly different view sometimes, because I have a slightly different background.

“I have learned a lot from the way head physio Nick Worth views things.

“And you sometimes find it works really well having the two different views on the same injury.”

Tobin admits himself that for a football-mad medical man, his post at Wanderers is just about as perfect a position as he would ever want.

“I don’t think it is something that any doctor could just walk into,” he added.

“I worked with some great physios at Preston – Steve Kemp and Matt Ratcliffe – and I think you need that sort of apprenticeship in professional football.

“You also need to know how to interact with the players because you do have to deal with many more different things than as a GP.

“Players are so much more aware of their bodies because they are the tools of their trade.”