Specialist on Aston Villa injury – What’s causing setback, and what’ll happen

Sports science specialist Markus Schauer says Aston Villa summer signing Leon Goretzka needs time to adapt to his new workload. 

The midfielder spent his entire career in Germany and the last eight years were with Bayern Munich, who released him at the end of last season.

This allowed Aston Villa to sign him for free in the summer window. The 31-year-old is yet to make his debut for the Premier League side.

Blow for new Aston Villa man 

Earlier this week, Leon Goretzka said his body has “reacted to the increased workload” at Aston Villa. Therefore, he needs a break to recover and regain full fitness.

On Tuesday, Sport Witness covered a report from Germany explaining that he’s suffered a knee injury and will be out until after the international break.

Abendzeitung spoke to renowned sports scientist Markus Schauer to get his views on the new Aston Villa player’s injury situation.

“The Premier League doesn’t necessarily require a fitter player. It requires a player to be able to handle very high intensity more frequently, with shorter recovery periods, and to be able to reproduce this despite increasing fatigue,” he said.

AZ states: ‘The combination of sprinting, acceleration, and deceleration, in particular, places a considerable strain on the body.’

The expert says there’s hardly any evidence that the German hasn’t prepared well for the Premier League.

“So, it’s not a question of a Bundesliga player being physically unprepared,”

“The body has to adapt to a slightly different workload profile and, in some cases, a different training intensity.”

Lack of pre-season impacting Goretzka

The former Bayern Munich star joined the Europa League winners on August 27th. This meant he didn’t do the pre-season with his new club.

Markus Schauer warns Leon Goretzka needs sufficient time to get into rhythm. In other words, Unai Emery can’t rely upon him immediately.

“If a player misses a full preseason, he doesn’t necessarily lack fitness, but possibly the gradually built-up tolerance for precisely these repeated high-intensity activities,” he added.