Martín Zubimendi was one of the few negative notes on Spain's brilliant debut against Slovenia in the U21 Euro Cup (0-3). The performance of the midfielder was good, but he had to retire injured in the second half after receiving a strong blow to the side. It must be remembered that the Real Sociedad player came to the tournament between cotton wool because of some discomfort in the hip.
This circumstance made Real fans tremble, since When this national team break is over, it will be the Copa del Rey final against Athletic (April 3). However, the injury has been somewhat minor. In fact, this Thursday Zubimendi jumped onto the pitch with the rest of the internationals and did recovery work normally. The midfielder, if nothing goes wrong, he hopes to be ready even for the all-important game that La Rojita will play next Saturday against Italy (9pm CEST).
Spain will be mathematically classified if it wins that match and, depending on the results, it could even tie the first place in case of adding the three points. In this unbeatable panorama for the National Team, The logical thing is that De la Fuente gave him rest in the third game (Tuesday 30 against the Czech Republic) so that he could reach the final in top condition.
That circumstance, that of rest, is something that neither the player nor the coach is considering at the moment. The clash against Italy is momentous and now efforts are being made for Zubimendi to finish recovering to be able to start again in that match. If he does not play it, Moncayola will be his substitute. But that will happen in the event that Zubimendi is not 100%. At the moment, while the classification is not sealed, in La Rojita there is no talk of anything other than the Eurocup. It is an atypical tournament as this first phase is in the middle of the club competitions, but during this week and a half there is only the National Team and Luis de la Fuente will not make any decision thinking about the commitments with the clubs. At least while qualification is at stake …