Barcelona Confirms Lamine Yamal’s Major Injury Blow

FC Barcelona officially announced on Monday afternoon that their star winger, Lamine Yamal, has sustained an injury, as shared through a statement on social media.

Furthermore, as part of something that isn’t common practice, the Catalans also revealed the 17-year-old’s expected recovery time.

“The first team player, Lamine Yamal, received a blow to the right ankle during the game against CD Leganes on Sunday,” the statement began.

“Tests carried out on Monday have revealed that the player has a grade 1 injury to a ligament in the ankle. The player is expected to be out for 3 to 4 weeks,” it added.

This development is a significant setback for Barcelona, as they will be unable to rely on their Kopa Trophy and Golden Boy Award winner for an important match against Atletico Madrid on Saturday.

Currently, he has a total of six goals and 11 assists this season, figures which place him third on the Barça list of top scorers behind Lewandowski and Raphinha. In all of Europe’s top five leagues, Lamine is third on the list of players who have provided the most assists.

Diego Simeone’s team will head to Montjuic to take on a side that has suffered defeats in their last two home matches against Las Palmas and Leganes. They are currently tied on points with the La Liga leaders, holding a game in hand.

In addition to this, Lamine is highly unlikely to play any part in a Spanish Cup semifinal clash with Athletic Club on January 8, nor a potential final against bitter rival Real Madrid or Mallorca a few days later providing it can beat the Basques.

Lamine’s knock is a reoccurrence of that which sidelined him in November, with the club once again revealing his expected recovery time.

On that occasion, it was up to three weeks, and Lamine was indeed out of action for 22 days and three games.

Two of those matches resulted in La Liga losses and draws against Real Sociedad and Celta Vigo, leading manager Hansi Flick to face questions about the team’s overreliance on the Euro 2024 champion from Spain.