Aston Villa midfielder Youri Tielemans has confirmed that he felt an issue in the warm-up ahead of Belgium’s clash with Spain and opted to avoid making it worse.
The 29-year-old has been an influential figure for his country at the World Cup this summer, but he wasn’t able to feature in their quarter-final encounter with Spain in Los Angeles on Friday.
Tielemans was initially named in the starting line-up by boss Rudi Garcia, but after leaving the warm-up prior to kickoff early, he was replaced and didn’t feature.
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Reports suggested shortly after the setback that it was an adductor issue and that it was a suspected tear that the midfield ace was managing and trying to work through.
However, clearly after trying to push himself in the warm-up, it was decided that he couldn’t feature in order to avoid aggravating the problem and suffering a more serious setback.
Speaking after the game, Tielemans provided some level of clarity on the situation as he allayed fears that it might be immediately evident that it is a serious issue, but time will tell just how severe the injury is and how long it might sideline him for, if at all, as he’ll undoubtedly undergo further tests in the coming days.
“When the body says stop, you can’t push it,” he told RTBF. “We are professional athletes, we try to give our all. We saw that many players were tired and exhausted. It didn’t work out for us in this match, but we gave everything. Hats off to everyone.”
With Amadou Onana suffering a serious knee injury earlier this week and he’s now set for a lengthy spell on the sidelines, the last thing that Villa needed was another major blow in midfield.
Our pre-season schedule gets underway in 10 days time, and while Tielemans will no doubt be given an extended break after his exploits in the USA this summer, it’s hoped that he can recover from his injury and feature at some point in our preparations to ensure that he’s ready for the start of the new Premier League campaign.
There is still a month to go until we face Paris Saint-Germain for the UEFA Super Cup, and while Boubacar Kamara looks to be making good progress in his own recovery from injury, hopefully we’ll see Tielemans line up alongside him for that encounter in Salzburg as the pair look to establish themselves at the heart of Unai Emery’s preferred XI again this season.