‘I felt quite guilty’: Jess Sergis reveals the financial sacrifices she’s made this year as Roosters star makes miracle recovery from injury

There were legitimate fears that Jess Sergis wouldn’t play again this year after she went down with a serious knee injury against the Wests Tigers, but after an excruciating rehab process and a financial sacrifice at work, the Roosters star is fit and firing for Sunday’s NRLW grand final.

Sergis is no stranger to pain having suffered a serious finger injury that kept her out of last year’s semi-final loss, but the hurt she felt watching on from the sidelines that day is what drove her to return from a knee issue that should have kept her out for months.

It happened back in round 3 against the Tigers in an innocuous tackle where she stayed down in agony for a few minutes, only to get up and score a cracking solo try a few moments later when you could see how hurt she was.

She missed the rest of the regular season but returned last week off the bench, with the representative centre named to start this weekend against Cronulla.

“When I first did it, I felt a pop and was in excruciating pain,” she said.

“I’ve done my MCL before, and comparing it to my other knee, it wasn’t as bad as I thought, which is why I got up and kept playing. I found out a few hours later after my scan that I didn’t feel any more pain because it was completely torn off.

“Once I did score that try and turned the corner to go towards the posts, I felt a lot of pain on that turning motion, so I knew there was something wrong but I didn’t know the extent of it.

“I would do anything for my team. I had no pain and couldn’t feel it anymore because it was pretty numb. I was just doing my job in the centres, caught the ball and kept going. I’d do it again tomorrow if I had to.”

Sergis admits she was “a little bit worried” that her season was over, but she was determined to prove the experts wrong, which is why she copped platelet-rich plasma (PSP) injections and relentlessly rehabbed the knee to try to get back.

“I got a few opinions and a couple said that it was season over and that I should rehab well and to not rush anything. But the fighter in me knew that I’d missed the semi-final last year with my hand, so it was a bit of a deja vu moment,” she said.

“I did everything in my power to come back and was a bit selfish in that I took five weeks off work to focus on my body full time.

“Work was so supportive and happy for me to live my dream. I had five weeks of full-blown rehab to focus on myself. I feel like if I didn’t do that then I wouldn’t have played on Sunday.

“I just knew my body. I did things that I’ve never done before like PRP injections which were horrible, but I knew in the long run that they’d be the best thing for my body.

“The club gave me all the facilities and everything I needed to do for that, and I took full advantage of that.”

The relentless fight to return meant Sergis had to take more than a month away from her job outside footy that showed how committed she was to play because she wasn’t able to earn her second income.

“I feel worse for my kids at work because I’m a support worker, so to take five weeks away from them, I felt quite guilty,” she said, with the injury highlighting the need for the competition to become fully professional.

“I knew that they love seeing me on the field so it wasn’t just for me, it was for them as well. It comes with sacrifices and financial hardship because we’ve all got to work, but this is more important for me.

“I’d rather be heading into the week that we’ve got, and I’d do it all again.

“It’s an easy decision when I’ve got such a great support network around me. My family is great, my partner is great and my boss is so supportive.

“When I started this job three years ago, she knew what she was getting herself into. She’s a massive Souths fan but she goes for the girls in the NRLW. It was an easy decision for her, she was so supportive and she knew what I had to do to get back.

“If I didn’t have the support there then it would have made that job much harder.”