Armando Broja picks up ankle injury on international duty

Albania played fellow non-World-Cup-qualifiers Italy in a friendly yesterday, with the Azzurri winning 3-1 away in Tirana, but as far as we’re concerned, the one notable outcome from the game was Chelsea striker Armando Broja picking up an ankle injury.

Proper Chels, that!

Fortunately, early indications are that the injury is just a “painful impact” type rather than any sort of ligament issue, but Broja has been sent back to Chelsea for further testing and evaluation. Albania are set to play Armenia later this week, while Italy have a game against Austria on Sunda. (Jorginho was not called up, with head coach Roberto Mancini selecting a fair few fresh faces.)

So, hopefully Broja’s injury is just minor indeed. While we do have over a month before matches resume, ankle sprains are never good and can easily linger beyond initial recovery periods. And we’ve certainly had our fill of injuries this season, and then some.