Palace centre forward Kwesi Appiah could be ruled out for weeks if not months after suffering a cruciate ligament injury in training. Appiah had been training with his national side, Gahana, ahead of taking on Mauritius in an 2017 AFCON qualifier. A spokesperson for the Gahanian FA confirmed the former Margate striker had been sent for scans and subsequently sent back to England for treatment.
Appiah who joined Palace back in 2012 received a shock call up for his national side earlier this year, he had been on a loan spell at Cambridge when former West Ham and Chelsea boss Avram Grant gave him the nod. The call up came with great surprise with Appiah struggling to make an impact for The Eagles.
Appiah had only made 6 appearances for the club having spent most of his time on loan in the lower leagues, with spells at the likes of Cambridge, AFC Wimbledon and Notts County
After an extremely surprising, yet successful call up to the 2015 AFCON squad .Appiah managed to stamp his mark on world football and earned heaps of praise especially from the Palace faithful who were watching from afar. Appiah manger to net once and win a penalty in the final of the tournament and earned himself a lot of suitors back in England with his eventual designation being Reading where he linked up with former Palace interviewee Steve Clarke. Again Appiah struggled to make an impact only making 6 appearances forTthe Royals but he did however grab a goal on the final day of the season in a victory against Derby.
Appiah has made an incredible rise from obscurity to being on the books of his national team, before being picked up by Palace he had spend nearly all of his time at Non-League clubs such as Margate, Thurrock and Brackley Town. The English born striker did have one stint in the Football League prior to his move to South London after he endured an unsuccessful stint at Peterbrough.
The injury to Appiah could be detrimental to the 24 year olds career as he embarks on probably the most important pre-season of his life. After being handed a new deal at the back end of last season Appiah would’ve been hoping to impress Palace boss Alan Pardew but now with this potentially long term injury it looks unlikely he’ll get that opportunity.
