The young Spanish midfielder Pedri has been going through a dark period at Barça in recent months. Plagued by endless injuries, the Catalan star is set to start 2024 away from the pitch, as he did at the start of 2023.
What is going on with Pedri Gonzalez Lopez, better known as Pedri, who has suffered injury after injury with Barça? That is the concern of many Catalans and Spaniards. After a very promising first season (2020-2021) with Barcelona and a Euro 2021 that revealed him to the world, the midfielder has been hampered by several lengthy injuries that have prevented him from playing a full season or most of it since. Absent on the final day of La Liga against Almeria due to overload, according to indications from the Catalan club, the 21-year-old, who was expected to be back on his feet this week, is not ready. This Tuesday, the Spanish press revealed a new muscular injury to the young player, who is starting to worry with these repetitive injuries.
Will Pedri be out for a long time?
Regarded as one of Barça’s most dependable performers, the player compared to Xavi and Iniesta has made just eight starts out of his club’s 20 or so games this season. At the age of 21, Pedri is suffering from one muscular injury after another, and is far worse than Ousmane Dembélé in terms of missed games. Notorious for repeatedly missing games through injury, the French winger, who has also missed a number of games for Barça, is no longer the man to break the dismal record for missed games.
As revealed by Spanish media outlet Sport, Pedri has missed 46% of Barcelona’s games through injury, far more than Dembélé, who missed 38% before joining PSG last summer. By then, he will already have accumulated more than three months of injury over the 2023-2024 season. Having arrived from Las Palmas in 2023, Pedri has played 120 games for Catalonia, scoring 17 goals.
Spanish Supercup withdrawal confirmed
Xavi’s man of trust since taking over the Barça bench in 2021, the young midfielder is putting his team in a complicated situation that is not going well. Capable of unlocking a game with his magical kicking, Pedri is set to miss more of Barcelona’s crucial fixtures at the start of the year, including the Spanish Supercup semi-final against Osasuna in Saudi Arabia in early January and possibly the final between Real Madrid or Atletico.
According to Mundo Deportivo, Pedri’s return has been pushed back from the end of the year to the end of January. It was the same scenario at the start of this year, with the player announced as having a short-term injury but ending up staying away until almost the end of the season. For Xavi, who has his back against the wall, this is a very bad situation, as he is already without the other key player in his midfield: Gavi. Now forced to cope without Pedri, it’s yet another headache added to the list of players at his disposal who are cruelly lacking in effectiveness.
Xavi’s plight
With several bookmakers already predicting that Barça will lose La Liga, the Supercup in January will be a crucial period for the club. Forced to win trophies to save his place, Xavi will have no room for error against Osasuna. Given the immense difficulties involved in winning a competition like the Champions League, the two competitions where the Blaugrana have a real card to play are the Spanish Supercup and the Copa del Rey.
Things cannot wait to improve for Pedri, whose situation is a cause for serious concern. Barça really need him for the second half of the season.
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