Chivas USA’s experienced striker Ante Razov has been ruled out of the first round of this year’s MLS playoffs. His Chivas USA side are slated to open up on the road away to the Kansas City Wizards. Razov had initially hurt his knee when he suffered a sprain in his club’s draw against FC Dallas back on the 11^th of October. What’s ironic is that Chivas USA manager Preki had indicated that it was his intention to rest a number of players over the final stretch of the season as they had already secured their playoff spot. In particular, he was going to rest Razov, 38 year old Claudio Suarez and 33 year old Jesse Marsch. Since the diagnosis was confirmed the day after the match, Razov has failed to appear in a single match.  

The initial estimated recovery time for Ante’s injury was 6 weeks. That would have kept him out of action until the last week of November and consequently ended his season. However, the 33 year old Razov recently underwent a procedure which teammate Jonathan Bornstein had had some success with earlier in the year. Bornstein had also sprained his knee but was able to return to action in just 2 weeks following what is called a Platelet Rich Plasma procedure. In short, it involves transferring blood from one part of the body, separating the platelets and plasma, and then injecting it into the injured knee.  

If, and only if, everything goes according to plan  Ante could be back on the pitch should Chivas be able to get past the Wizards and advance to the semifinals. His absence will be a huge blow for the club  in the first round as the two players slated to replace him- John Cunliffe and Laurent Merlin- combined to score 4 goals this season. Meanwhile, Razov has scored 11 this season and 109 in his MLS career.

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