UDINE. That’s good news, but it may still be bad news. The pun from “quizzone” concerns Sandi Lovric who on Tuesday first November received the response of the instrumental investigations to which he underwent to verify the extent of the injury that materialized suddenly after only 8 minutes of the resumption of the game on the field of Cremonese, when he was replaced with Lazar Samardzic after kicking the ball in a lateral foul and putting his hand to the thigh of his right leg.
Well, the tests have fortunately excluded the flexor muscles. And up to here you can crack a half smile, for sure Andrea Sottil will have done it, who immediately, as soon as the Slovenian left the field passing through the Zini stadium bench reserved for the bianconeri, tried to understand the extent of the injury, receiving in exchange a gesture of explanation from the player with his hand, clenched into a fist, as if he had felt a contracture.
The truth is that it is “only” an inflammation that will deprive Udinese of Lovric for Friday’s match against Lecce, the first of three in nine days, the last tour de force before the championship stop Serie A reserved for the World Cup in Qatar. It is impossible to immediately return Lovric who will instead be monitored day after day to understand if everything is actually okay, since the inflammation concerns an old muscle scar.
As some will recall, Isaac Success also had a problem of this type last year, but much more marked, so much so that the stop was much longer, since relapses cannot be excluded.
For this, Lovric will be kept out of this week as a precaution, in the hope that everything will evolve for the best and will be among the squads for next Tuesday’s away match in La Spezia.
A hope that Rodrigo Becao also cultivates, he too weighs with a muscle problem, more precisely a strain, always in the flexors of the right thigh, an injury remedied last October 16 at the Olimpico in Rome against Lazio, a match in which he had been cautioned in warning and which led to the disqualification against Torino. Unfortunately, however, the problem was not resolved in time for the next trip to Cremona, but the Brazilian still continued to work separately with the aim of returning before the long break. Even for him, however, no Lecce. Fingers crossed for him too in view of the match against Spezia.
So Sottil will have a limited range of choices for Friday, both in defense, where the trio composed of Neheun Perez, Bijol and Ebosse are working overtime, also considering Masina’s long injury (operated on in a knee), and in midfield now, where he will not have the usual four mezzals to rotate after an hour of play.