MVP assistant coach injured in car crash

PAUL Francis, assistant coach and brother of MVP Track & Field Club head coach Stephen Francis, underwent surgery on his right leg at the Spanish Town Hospital after being involved in a car accident on Highway 2000 early yesterday.

Francis sustained injuries after the car in which he was travelling was struck by another vehicle while he was travelling along the St Catherine leg of the highway.

The Observer understands that the injury was to the same leg that Francis had broken in another accident two years ago.

This mishap comes less than a year after triple World and Olympic gold medallist Usain Bolt was involved in a single-vehicle accident on the same stretch of road built by French-based company, Bouygues Travaux Publics.

Meanwhile, the president of MVP Track Club, Bruce James, and club associate Olive McNaughton, were bombarded by calls yesterday as rumours swirled that former world record holder Asafa Powell had been the one involved in the accident.

"No, Asafa has not been in a car accident... I don't know where that mix-up in information happened," James told the Observer.

McNaughton said she had been told by a representative of a leading mobile provider that a text had been sent via 'Blackberry Messenger' that Powell had been involved in an accident and was critically injured and in hospital.