Welcome to Upfront, I'm Chloe Morgan. And I'm Rachel Sullivan. We're here with a slightly

different episode today. Beth Mees' recent injury meant she joined an alarmingly long

list of women's players who are currently out with ACL injuries. Simone McGill, Alexia

Patayas and Ellie Carpenter are just some of the players across the game who have suffered

these awful injuries too in recent months. The stats are shocking. I mean female footballers

are up to six times more likely to suffer an ACL injury than their male counterparts.

So on today's Upfront, we're asking why this is such a prominent problem in our sport,

what it's like to actually go through it and what can be done about it.

Later, we'll be joined by Aston Villa's Remy Allen who ruptured her as back in April while

playing against Manchester United in the WSL to discuss the mental and physical challenges

of overcoming such a big injury. But first, last week, I caught up with Dr. Emma Ross.

She's a female athlete health specialist who co-founded the Well HQ, which helps educate coaches

and athletes about women's bodies in sport. Dr. Ross, thank you so much for joining us.

I feel like you've come in a very important time. It feels like with the growth of the game,

we've also seen a massive growth in the number of these injuries, Beth Mead, the latest one,

obviously. It feels like it's really becoming a bit of an endemic in the women's game,

would you agree with that? Yeah, I mean, I think when you play football at a high level,

there is always a risk of injury and ACL, unfortunately, is a very common injury in football because

of the nature of running, jumping, turning, sprinting, stopping. But we do know, we've got

enough research to suggest that in female players, the ACL risk is greater, and that really

seems to be coming through and reality doesn't it, that we're seeing a number of female players

suffering ACL injury time and time again, and it's not a new phenomenon, but we don't seem to be

...