Bacary Sagna Fractures Leg Against Norwich: Here's Why He'll Come Back Stronger

Two leg breaks in one year (on the same leg, no less) is something no one should have to endure. Not least a man as upstanding as Arsenal fullback Bacary Sagna.

The trials and tribulations don't stop there for the Frenchman of Senagalese descent, though. Sometimes the most difficult burdens are psychological rather than physical.

Sagna lost his brother Omar in winter of 2008 to a seizure, a terribly cruel twist of fate which flung him into a crippling bout of depression.

But you'd never have known the torment swirling inside Sagna given his excellent play on the field. His assuredness in defense often took on the guise of the impeccable.

Sagna was named to the Professional Footballers Association (PFA) and Football Writers Association (FWA) Premier League Teams of the Year in 2008 and 2009, two seasons ('07-08 and '08-09) during which he was widely regarded as the best right-back in the league, not to mention one of the best in the world.

His form dipped somewhat in 2009-10, although he made marked improvements in his crossing and attacking play.

The blip in his form had a source, though. Omar's memory was still haunting Sagna, something he admitted to L'Equipe Magazine in February 2010. When the article went to press, it was just past the two-year anniversary of his brother's death.

Sagna soon learned he was not alone in dealing with his heartbreak.

"The club psychologist came to see me before an away game and asked if I was okay," Sagna told L'Equipe.

"The club psychologist came to see me before an away game and asked if I was okay. I said yes, and he answered: ‘I am not sure, your eyes are empty’. He was right. I wasn’t there. Sometimes, I would get back home after training and not even remember the road I had taken. In matches, it was the same. I was seeing the ball in slow motion. I was thinking, thinking." [...] 

"Then a striker went past me, [but] I couldn’t care."

Sagna described it a passage a vide, a fugue-like state where he was simply traipsing through life in a perpetual fog with little care for himself.

Slowly but surely, though, Sagna came back to the light, was named once more to the PFA and FWA Teams of the Year in 2011, and has since continued to be one of the best players for Arsene Wenger and the Gunners. Few are more reliable than Sagna in defense, and fewer still are more dedicated stewards of the club.

That's why the news that Sagna will now face yet another lengthy spell in the rehabilitation room following his leg break against Norwich makes for such sadness.

It's rare to find a better man than Sagna, whose tweets are more often geared toward foundations and family than personal interest.

To see Sagna slump to the turf just one-third of the way into the game, agony etched in every line of his face, was to feel your throat clutch with that horrible grip that accompanies such sights.

It was a cruel instance of deja vu. Sagna had gone barreling into the advertisement boards at White Hart Lane back in October, eventually crumpling to the track after enduring the sickening thud that had first fractured his leg.

He came back from that first break stronger than ever, helping key Arsenal's terrific run of form through March and the first half of April. (They've been poor recently; that 3-3 draw to Norwich is looking uglier each time I run across the recap on my computer screen.)

Quick: name a goal Arsenal have conceded for which Sagna was at fault.

Difficult task, no?

For all Arsenal's defensive liabilities, which have been discussed to no end in recent seasons, Sagna has often served as a source of calm amid that veritable storm that clusters around the Gunners' penalty area.

He is a full French international (32 caps), who played at Euro 2008 and the 2010 World Cup. He often earns praise for his positioning and tackling.

This summer's European Championships are now out of the question, and Sagna will be forced to watch the tournament from home rather than walk out onto the pitches in Poland and Ukraine alongside his teammates.

It is the latest in a long line of Job-ian twists of fate for a man who does not deserve the tribulation. Sagna's mentality will be challenged once more as he stares down months of tedious rehab.

But just as he said back in 2008 following Omar's death, you can rest assured that you'll see Sagna back in Arsenal red next season, strong as ever.

"Now I have to show everyone that I am strong, to show my family I am strong and to carry on with my team-mates." And soldier on he did.

History doesn't repeat, but it does rhyme. Sagna experienced that with his injury on Saturday. We'll see that adage reinforced again (in a decidedly more positive light) next season when the right-back gets back to locking up Premier League opponents with such impressive regularity.