It wouldn’t be an international break without us having some sort of concern about a Juventus player returning to Turin after playing a game or two with some sort of injury.
And it looks like Francisco Conceição will be our first — and hopefully only — concern when it comes to Juve players returning from their national team duty with an injury.
Or, when it comes to Conceição, being forced to leave their national team camp early due to an injury. Which, as you can probably guess by connecting the dots,
is what happened for Conceição, who returned to Turin on Monday after withdrawing from the Portugal camp due to an apparent muscle injury, according to a statement from the country’s federation. After arriving back in Italy, Conceição basically went straight from Turin-Caselle Airport to JMedical to be evaluated as quick as possible so that Juventus can deem the severity ahead of this weekend’s Derby d’Italia against Inter Milan at the Allianz Stadium.
Conceição was an unused sub in Portugal’s 5-0 win over Armenia in their World Cup qualifier this past Saturday.
Portugal’s statement on Conceição’s injury status read as follows: “The player had muscular discomfort and was declared unfit for the game against Hungary by the FPF Health and Performance director.”
Considering how quickly Conceição went from the Turin airport over to JMedical upon his return to Italy, it’s pretty evident that Juventus want immediate answers when it comes to just how severe this injury may be. As you can already guess, it’s feeling pretty safe to say Conceição’s status for the clash with Inter on Saturday is now up in the air. What happens beyond that is hard to say, which will be crucial to see once the scans are completed and Juve actually release the details of how long he may be out.
But if Conceição is out for even a couple of weeks, it will open up an opportunity for either summer signings who arrived on Deadline Day in Edon Zhegrova Loïs Openda or possibly Teun Koopmeiners, who has played more a deeper role in the double pivot so far this season.
