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Barcelona star Lamine Yamal keeps making headlines.
Keystone
Lamine Yamal delights football fans around the world. Recently, however, the 18-year-old has been repeatedly slowed down by groin problems. Barcelona are therefore very worried about the superstar.
Yamal has already won the league twice with Barça, triumphed in the cup and won the European Championship with Spain. It's easy to forget that this magical footballer is only 18 years old. The fact that he continues to make headlines off the pitch is probably partly due to his age. According to reports in the Spanish media, club bosses are increasingly concerned about his behavior. Barça, together with Yamal's advisor Jorge Mendes, therefore want to monitor all of the star footballer's interviews and social media activities more closely in order to protect him from doing anything stupid. Yamal has accepted the measure.
However, there are even greater concerns in Barcelona regarding Yamal's state of health. He has played nine games this season, scoring four goals and setting up five. Absolute top figures. But Yamal has also missed five games due to a groin injury.
According to a report in the Spanish newspaper "Sport", the FC Barcelona medical department fears that the pain could become chronic. Specialist doctor Luis Ripoll has recently identified signs of pubalgia in Yamal: "The condition is characterized by pain that limits the player's movement and shooting ability by almost 50 percent. That's exactly what we saw in him in the Clásico", said the doctor on the radio program "El Larguero".
Physiotherapist Lluís Puig explains on "Sport": "Pubalgia is not a muscle injury that heals by itself. The pain occurs at the point where different muscle groups converge at the pubic bone. This makes recovery slow and unpredictable."
In young players, this could also be linked to their rapid physical development: "As you grow, your posture changes and some muscle groups can't always keep up. It's something you have to learn to live with, not something you just have treated and then disappears."
Colloquially, athletic pubalgia is also referred to as an athlete's ridge. However, the media, who are already speculating about the end of Yamal's career, are doing so too soon. A single example is enough to underline this. Lionel Messi was plagued by the same problems in his early years. The whole world knows what kind of career he had ...
