Will Raúl Jiménez be fit for the World Cup?
The Mexican international suffered a knee and abductor injury in the friendly against Besiktas and he will be out for almost eight weeks.
Bad news for Wolverhampton and the Mexico national team: Raúl Jiménez has suffered another serious injury. The 31-year-old will be out for around eight weeks after injuring his knee and abductor on Wednesday in Wolves’ 3-0 friendly win over Turkish side Besiktas.
“Raul came off in the game against Besiktas after he stretched for the ball and felt something in his knee and his groin,” said the Premier League club on social media. “Scans reveal that he has suffered a medial collateral ligament injury to his knee and a minor strain of his adductor. Neither injury is very serious but he is expected to be out for a number of weeks.”
Another setback for Jiménez
This means that the former Club América striker will miss the start of the 2022/23 Premier League campaign but if the recovery goes as planned, he will be ready for the FIFA World Cup with Mexico. This latest injury will also affect Wolves because they will be reliant on Jiménez to lead the attack after sending Fabio Silva on loan to Anderlecht.
Jiménez has struggled to regain peak form since recovering from a fractured skull he suffered in November 2020 and this could affect his status with club and national team. The 31-year-old has been Mexico’s undisputed starting striker since Gerardo Martino took over the managerial job and has scored 30 goals in 97 appearances.
However, since Jiménez returned for Mexico in October 2021 he has struggled to find the back of the net and this in turn has put Martino in the hot seat due to the side’s poor results over the past year. During that time, Jiménez has only scored three goals in 10 appearances and all of those were from the penalty spot.