Just days before the Copa America Centenario begins, one of the tournaments top contenders is suffering greatly from the injury bug.
La Albiceleste will likely be without Lucas Biglia for the entire tournament due to a left abductor injury.
Lionel Messi is currently in Spain awaiting his tax evasion trial, but the Barcelona star forward is still recovering a back injury suffered against Honduras. The 28-year-old is scheduled to return to Argentina’s training on Saturday, but his status for Monday’s match against Chile is uncertain.
Additionally, several other key players on the Argentine roster are being monitored closely. Attacking duo Javier Pastore (Paris Saint-Germain) and Ezequiel Lavezzi (Hebei China Fortune) are each facing uncertainties for the beginning of the competition with muscle injuries, while Tottenham’s Erik Lamela is also set to miss the Chile fixture with a sore ankle.
In the case of Biglia, if he is ruled out for the entire tournament then Argentina could replace him with either Matias Kranevitter or Augusto Fernandez, who both trained with the squad on Tuesday.
How do these injuries affect Argentina’s chances in Copa America? How far do you see La Albiceleste advancing?
Share your thoughts below.
Um ya, NO! YOU may care more about the Euros, and they may be more prestigious from a popularity and economic stand-point (however with this addition in the US and the problems in France, Copa will give the Euros a run) There was a time that SA teams weren’t taking Copa too seriously, those days are over. Brazil had a serious conflict hosting the Olympics and having never won gold. Other than that, explain to me how the Euros matter and Copa America doesn’t? That’s just some subjective BS. As for SA not winning anything other than “Confed 2009” (and 2005, and 2013) It’s true Europe is on a 3 WC winning streak, Brazil, Argentina or Uruguay will balance that back out.
Lamela stands to miss the opening game due to a “sore ankle”, really?? I’m sorry to say it but some of these SA teams are soft and it has shown for a number of years. Their toughness is questionable anytime a player will miss a game because of a sore ankle. It stands to reason that no SA team has won a global tourney in forever(unless you count Brazil beating the US in ’09 in the Confeds Cup final), their mentality in the big games has been a talking point for years and this to me doesn’t soften the blow
Well, ankles are kind of important for a soccer player. A sore ankle can turn into surgery in one wrong step. Saying a whole continent is weak because one players decided to rest a painful joint is kind of moronic.
BTW, South Americans are known for being some of the toughest players around. You just don’t make it everywhere around the world by being weak.
If you just had to beat Panama and Bolivia to advance to the 2nd round you would probably rest some players too. Almost all of their back ups are also from major clubs in Europe as well so its not like they drop off a lot resting guys until the knockout round.
Uh, no south american team has won in forever? 2002 is not that long ago in world cup terms. 98 was an amazing french team and a sick Ronaldo (and thank god because otherwise I never would’ve heard the end of the Brazil 3peat). The, I’ll give you that Argentina has generally underperformed, but this last German team was 8 years in coming, and Spain was truly indomitable. So you can’t really put this stuff on Latin americans being weak. If you look at the last world cup, also, though none of them won it… they all made it out of their groups. If anything Europe under-performed in this last edition. (Spain, Portugal, Italy, England… they all sucked horribly.)
“Injuries”
for reals.. it’s always curious how many of the bigger team / name players have “injuries” right after their last game of the season.
You don’t hear a lot of injuries preventing players from seeing action in the upcoming Euros, though. Reason?
Simple: Euro’s actually matter and this year’s version of the Copa Cenetario does not.
Yeah, I don’t blame them. none of these guys are wanting for money and the prestige is just not there for this tournament. No need to push your luck.
Give them time Old School, they still have another week on the Copa. Although, Euros are always taken more seriously since you have to qualify for them.
Reus was left off the German roster.