Single-leg landings following a volleyball spike may increase the risk of anterior cruciate ligament injury more than landing on both-legs

Datao Xu, Xinyan Jiang, Xuanzhen Cen, Julien Baker*, Yaodong Gu*

*Corresponding author for this work

    Research output: Contribution to journalJournal articlepeer-review

    67 Citations (Scopus)

    Abstract

    Volleyball players often land on a single leg following a spike shot due to a shift in the center of gravity and loss of balance. Landing on a single leg following a spike may increase the probability of non-contact anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) injuries. The purpose of this study was to compare and analyze the kinematics and kinetics differences during the landing phase of volleyball players using a single leg (SL) and double-leg landing (DL) following a spike shot. The data for vertical ground reaction forces (VGRF) and sagittal plane were collected. SPM analysis revealed that SL depicted a smaller knee flexion angle (about 13.8) and hip flexion angle (about 10.8) during the whole landing phase, a greater knee and hip power during the 16.83–20.45% (p = 0.006) and 13.01–16.26% (p = 0.008) landing phase, a greater ankle plantarflexion angle and moment during the 0–41.07% (p < 0.001) and 2.76–79.45% (p < 0.001) landing phase, a greater VGRF during the 5.87–8.25% (p = 0.029), 19.75–24.14% (p = 0.003) landing phase when compared to DL. Most of these differences fall within the time range of ACL injury (30–50 milliseconds after landing). To reduce non-contact ACL injuries, a landing strategy of consciously increasing the hip and knee flexion, and plantarflexion of the ankle should be considered by volleyball players.

    Original languageEnglish
    Article number130
    Number of pages14
    JournalApplied Sciences (Switzerland)
    Volume11
    Issue number1
    Early online date25 Dec 2020
    DOIs
    Publication statusPublished - 1 Jan 2021

    Scopus Subject Areas

    • General Materials Science
    • Instrumentation
    • General Engineering
    • Process Chemistry and Technology
    • Computer Science Applications
    • Fluid Flow and Transfer Processes

    User-Defined Keywords

    • Non-contact ACL injuries
    • Sagittal biomechanics
    • Statistical parametric mapping (SPM)
    • Volleyball spike landing

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