SPANISH PRODIGY MARCO Asensio will miss the opener to Real Madrid’s second consecutive defence of the Champions League due to an infected ‘pimple,’ manager Zinedine Zidane has confirmed.
The 21-year-old attacker had missed training this week, and Zidane told a pre-match news conference ahead of tonight’s game with Apoel Nicosia that Asensio had a “pimple… which stopped him pulling up his socks.”
Subsequent reports in the local Madrid press would confirm that Asensio had accrued the infection while shaving his legs.
ABC report that Asensio “had a problem with a pore when depilating [shaving] his legs. A hair has become infected and that has caused him a wound that has not allowed him to pull up his socks.”
Due to the perceived weakness of tonight’s opposition, Zidane saw it best to allow Asensio to recover from what is essentially believed to amount to to an ingrown hair.
Cristiano Ronaldo, however, is available for his first competitive club game in a month, while centre-back Raphael Varane also returns from injury.
Kick-off at the Bernabéu is at 7:45pm.
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