Roma Right Back Crisis: Nura Out for Inter

Eusebio Di Francesco and Roma were already up against it this Saturday in their home opener, welcoming the red hot Mauro Icardi and the rest of the rejuvenated Inter Milan to the Olimpico. Though the season only started last week, even the most novice viewer can tell that this year’s Inter is an entirely different beast. Emboldened by Luciano Spalletti, Inter looks like a legitimate threat already. So, quite naturally Roma are in the throes of a defensive crisis.

With Alessandro Florenzi and Rick Karsdorp already out with pre-existing injuries, Bruno Peres was being leaned on heavily through the late summer, playing virtually every minute of the club’s summer tour. And while his summer wasn’t without its flaws, Peres looked like he was heading in the right direction. That was until the second half against Atalanta when Peres went down twice within five minutes before being subbed off for Federico Fazio, forcing EDF into an awkward Kostas Manolas, Juan Jesus, Fazio and Aleksandar Kolarov backline.

Following the match, Bruno Peres was ruled out two weeks with a leg injury, but nothing was torn or ruptured and nothing imploded. Roma could handle this. Besides, it seemingly paved the way for Nura Abdullahi to finally get some first team minutes. Nura, one of Roma’s brightest prospects, has had his career derailed already by severe leg injuries, so getting an opportunity to stake his claim so early in the season would have been a boon to his progression.

Yeah, about that. Somehow, someway, Nura picked up his own knock, suffering a tendon injury in his right thigh, an injury that will reportedly keep him sidelined for six to eight weeks, leaving Roma effectively right-back-less against Spalletti’s formidable attack on Saturday.

In the immediate sense, this probably forces EDF to use Jesus as a makeshift right back because he is literally the only option at this point, short of pushing Radja Nainggolan back to defense, meaning an already tough match has just become that much more difficult.

But this is what happens when you rely so heavily on one player throughout an already ill-conceived summer tour, while all your backups are either injured, recovering from injury or suffered an injury before/during/after you paid €19 million for him.

This club is just ridiculous at times, does this happen in other places?