Alex Sandro out at least two weeks after suffering thigh injury in training

And less than 48 hours before Andrea Pirlo is set to manage his first official game with Juventus, he will have one less fullback at his disposal.

Because, as you probably guessed, the one thing Juventus can afford to do without is somebody who is actually a natural fullback. Juve’s roster is just brimming with fullbacks that losing one will hardly be noticeable and things will just run as smoothly as they did beforehand.

(That is sarcasm. Please don’t actually believe that.)

Juventus announced in a very brief recap of Friday’s training that Alex Sandro had to leave before the session came to an end as a result of a thigh injury. Part of the brief announcement was that Sandro was going to get further tests done Saturday, which would likely result in some kind of timetable for how much time he would miss. The verdict came in just as they said it would, and Sandro will now miss at least two weeks due to the thigh injury he suffered in training, with check-up tests scheduled for 15 days from now. (Also of note from Saturday’s training recap was the fact that Paulo Dybala took part in a chunk of training with the group, which means he could be returning to 100 percent soon.)

This means that Sandro is out of Sunday’s season opener against Sampdoria as well as the subsequent matches against Roma and Napoli in all likelihood before we head into the first international break of the 2020-21 campaign.

With Sandro out for the next couple of weeks at the very least, it’s either Luca Pellegrini time or a shot for Mattia De Sciglio to get his first start in months. And those of us who are admirers of Pellegrini, that is quite the positive to come out of all of this even though you don’t want to see another player get injured on the eve of the 2020-21 getting underway.

Even though rumors continue to persist that Genoa are interested in signing Pellegrini on loan — YOU GOT MARKO PJACA WHAT ELSE DO YOU WANT?! — he is obviously the more intriguing option to take over on the left side of Pirlo’s expected 3-5-2 formation. He is the more talented player, and we all know that, at this point, De Sciglio is what he is — and that’s pretty much just as an average player who just offers a little bit of defensive solidarity and that’s about it.