Playing sports is a fantastic way of exercising and socialising with others at the same time. While most sports are relatively safe, accidents can happen that can result in you receiving an injury.
When you participate in a sport, you are essentially accepting that you are at some risk of receiving an injury. For example, a pulled muscle or impact injuries.
What separates an accident in public with a sports injury claim will be the presence of blame on another party for your injury.
At Brown Turner Ross, we can manage your personal injury claim and help get you the compensation that you may need in order to pay for rehabilitation, therapy, or to compensate you for any time lost at work.
Who is responsible for my sports injury?
Most of the time there will not be an automatic assignment of blame when someone gets injured whilst playing sports.
If everyone involved plays fair and according to the rules of the sport that you are playing, as well as the rules of the venue where you are playing, then your injury may have been an accident.
However, if another party is negligent in some way and this results in an injury to yourself that could have been avoided then they may be responsible for your injury.
On top of this, similar to if you had an accident in a supermarket because of hazards that should have been removed, if the venue where you are playing is not maintained to a safe standard then the sports venue may be responsible for your injury.
Getting Sports injury compensation
Compensation for sports injury claims is not a fixed amount.
Like with other personal injury claims, there will be general damages and special damages that you can claim for and this will make up your entire compensation amount.
If you are successful with your claim then the other party will also be responsible for paying your legal and medical fees.
You will be able to use your compensation to pay for therapy or medical rehabilitation that you might need in order to fully recover from your injuries.
On top of this, your compensation will cover you for any income lost by not being able to work due to your injuries as well as any income that you may lose in the future.
Although you have three years after the date of your injury to pursue a claim (or three years from the date you turn 18 if the accident happened whilst you were a child), you should try your best to gather as much evidence as possible as soon as you can following your injury to have the best chance of progressing your claim quickly.
Who will I claim against?
Your claim will be against whoever you believe to be responsible for your injury. This may be one individual, a group of people or a business.
The individuals may have been participants in your sport, officials or organisers, or even medical staff if they were responsible for your injury.
In some specific circumstances, you may have to go through the process of suing the council if you were playing sports in a public park or other area managed by your local council. This will be a more difficult claim to make as there are plenty of hidden rules that councils have which may prevent liability. We will be able to work with you if this is the case to help your case as best as we can.
Examples of sports injury claims
We will provide you with a few examples of sports injury claims so that you can see if you potentially have a sports injury claims case.
- You are playing football and a hazard on the pitch that you could not see resulted in you breaking your leg. In this case, the owner of the venue or whoever is responsible for its maintenance would be responsible for your injury.
- Your child is injured while playing rugby at school. Their teacher gave them the wrong instruction and as a result your child received an injury that could have been prevented if they had the correct instruction. In this case, the teacher would be responsible for your child’s injury.
- If you are playing cricket and an individual holding the bat is behaving recklessly with it and as a result you become injured, then they may be responsible for your injury as they were not behaving in a manner that you would expect them to for the sport.
Looking for a Sports injury solicitor?
If you believe that you have been injured while playing sport and it was because of the negligence of someone else then contact our personal injury team at Brown Turner Ross today. We’ll work with you to get to the bottom of your case – and get you the compensation and help that you deserve.