The striker suffered a fractured skull in the opening stages of Sunday’s meeting with Arsenal, after an accidental aerial clash with David Luiz, which left Wolves’ players worried for the health of their colleague and friend. However, with the majority of the game remaining, the skipper explains how Wolves refocused and secured three points for Jimenez, who remained at the front of their minds throughout.
On praying for Raul
“We were massively worried when it happened, you knew straight away it was serious. We hope David Luiz is OK as well. It was a horrible clash of heads, this happens in football, but you don’t like to see it.
“It’s horrible to see with not just one of your teammates, but one of your friends, because that’s what we all are. He’s with the right people, which is the most important thing, but we just hope and pray that everything’s OK, because he’s the one we’re thinking about right now.”
On the incident itself
“I was at the front, just behind him, so I jumped, and you heard it. As they dropped, he was on his side, and it was important we kept him on his side and got the doctors on. When you see them drop and they’re not really responding, it becomes horrible to see. Player health comes into question and comes before any sort of performance.
“It’s something we never want to see, especially with one of our teammates, or with anybody in the Premier League. We got a fantastic result, but the one thing that matters is making sure Raul and David Luiz are both OK.”
💬 "We just hope and pray that he's going to be alright."
— Wolves (@Wolves) November 29, 2020
©️💛 pic.twitter.com/gkFvzfEz6T
On coming in at half-time
“The first question we asked when we went in was, ‘How’s Raul?’ because people’s health, with heads and bodies, come to the forefront in these situations, so it’s important we get Raul sorted because it’s a massive collision he had.”
On refocusing on the game
“You’ve got to [refocus]. We had 80 minutes left of the game, so you’ve got to. You go and play and hope you get the win for Raul. We had to do it for him, he’s a massive part of this football club, he’s a massive friend to every single one of us in that changing room.
“We had a job to do, we needed to be professional. He was at the forefront of all our minds, and at the same time we knew we had to do a job to come to a tough place like this and get a result.”
On a fine performance
“We’re trying to get better, trying to evolve, and I think you can see that. You can see the club try and move in the right direction and it’s something we need to move along with as players. We’re enjoying playing, we’re learning new things from our manager.
“To come here and win is no mean feat, it’s a fantastic result, because when you come to the Emirates you don’t often get results, not many teams come here and get results, so it’s huge for us, it’s something we can take forward. Looking at the performance, I feel like we did quite well.
“I thought the lads were fantastic from start to finish. We had to dig in at the end, but we knew we were going to have to with a goal advantage. The result and performance were fantastic, we’re made up with it, but let’s just hope Raul’s alright.”
