Athletic Injury & Recovery | Content Writer Insights

Injuries, regardless of the team’s physical condition and level of play, are being Athletic’s Achilles’ heel this season, the return to the Champions League eleven years later. Their franchise players, such as Iñaki and Nico Williams or Sancet, have suffered repeated setbacks that have prevented them from performing at the level of the previous campaign and the team, logically, suffers. But they have not been the only ones. The plague of casualties has affected all lines, which has forced some players, such as Jauregizar, to play many more minutes than expected. Ernesto Valverde has rarely been able to use the entire squad and on many occasions he has had to make do with bobbin lace. Up to 18 players have suffered some mishap of greater or lesser degree, many of them muscular. This means that more than 66% of the staff has been on sick leave at some point during the course. Athletic, unlike other First Division clubs that offer detailed sick leave reports, never makes public the possible recovery period and limits itself to including a generic “pending evolution.” This is the war report so far this year.

He was the player called to alternate the forward position with Guruzeta, but it was not possible. He started the season with discomfort in his right knee and, although he played 9 official matches in which he scored a goal, he finally had to undergo surgery on November 3, after the problem worsened. He has missed a total of 21 games and no return date has yet been set. His physical corpulence means that the club prefers to be cautious with him, as Ernesto Valverde recently recognized. “I don’t know when he will be able to return,” admitted the coach. Maroan joined Athletic in the winter market last year from Barakaldo and this campaign, in which he began with the group since pre-season, he was expected to take a step forward.

Last year, together with Mikel Jauregizar, he was chosen to form the double pivot in the red and white engine room in important games. The man from Eibar and the man from Bermeo got together perfectly, but this year their contribution has decreased. In August he suffered an overload in the hamstring muscles of his left leg and missed the match against Betis in La Cartuja that ended with a red and white victory (1-2). Likewise, in November he was not against Levante in the Ciutat de Valencia due to an accumulation of cards. Valverde has dosed him, despite the losses in the midfield, aware of his importance in the game and it has been Alejandro Rego who has taken over in recent weeks.

One of Valverde’s wild cards due to his ability to adapt to any of the attacking positions. At the end of September it was learned that he suffers from traumatic arthritis in the metatarsophalangeal joint of the first toe of his right foot that is causing him great trouble this season and prevents him from performing at his best at many times. After playing with discomfort for some time and the pain increasing, he had to stop and missed the league matches against Villarreal and Mallorca, as well as the second day of the Champions League against Borussia Dortmund. On January 12, he suffered from the same ailment, so he underwent treatment with physiotherapists again and missed the Copa del Rey round of 16 match against Cultural Leonesa and the penultimate round of the Champions League in Bergamo against Atalanta.

Beñat Prados’ serious knee injury placed him, due to experience and hierarchy, as one of the main candidates to oxygenate Jauregizar and Galarreta in the midfield, but he has not found his place. After taking the field in the second half against Villarreal on matchday 7 of the League – September 27 –, he had to be replaced due to a muscle injury in the adductor longus of his right leg that made him miss the visit to Dortmund in the Champions League, as well as the eighth and ninth matches of the League against Mallorca and Elche. Likewise, on January 6, he had to withdraw from training prior to the Super Cup match in Jeddah due to discomfort in his lower back that kept him in the dry dock for another two weeks. He missed the games against Cultural Leonesa in the Cup and Mallorca in the League.

The axis of the defense is perhaps the position that has suffered the most from injuries and long-term suspensions such as that of Yeray Álvarez for doping, forcing Ernesto Valverde to have to improvise on more than one occasion. Yuri has been chosen to cover contingencies as happened, for example, against PSG in San Mamés. Vivián, in the team’s tone, has been irregular and less forceful than last year until he was injured on January 27. After the defeat against Sevilla at the Pizjuán, he suffered an overload in the adductor muscles of his left leg, which is why he missed the last Champions League match against Sporting de Portugal, the derby against Real Sociedad and the Cup quarterfinals against Valencia. It is a doubt against Levante.

The eldest Williams, who had played 251 consecutive games without injury until the 2022-2023 season, is experiencing a journey of the cross this year. On October 4 against Mallorca he had to be replaced due to an overload in the tensor fascia of his left leg and he was unable to attend the Ghana team’s training camp. Three weeks later – the 22nd – he suffered a severe injury to the adductor muscles of his right leg against Qarabag in the Champions League and missed 9 games – seven in the League and two in the Champions League. It doesn’t end there because on January 18 he had to withdraw from training after suffering a mild-moderate problem in the triceps surae of his left leg that kept him in dry dock for three more games. He reappeared last Sunday against Real Sociedad.

Athletic managed to renew Nico last summer and the athletic team’s expectations rose like wildfire. However, the youngest of the saga has been hampered by injuries and has not had continuity. At the beginning of September 2025, he suffered a moderate injury to his left adductor playing with Spain in Turkey in the first of the qualifying windows for the World Cup in the United States, Mexico and Canada, which caused him to miss a month of competition – six games. Added to this is the fact that the pubalgia that he has had since last season has not completely healed and has forced him to be absent in five of the eight Champions League games, in addition to the Super Cup. He recently had a consultation with a specialist who is going to establish new treatment guidelines that could force him to stop for several more weeks.

His signing on the horn and the subsequent bureaucratic problems due to the Saudi Al-Nassr not sending the documentation on time kept the fans in suspense. Finally, on September 11, FIFA authorized the registration of the Agen centre-back, who played his first match against Valencia in Mestalla – fifth day of the League – after a rigorous expulsion of Vivián. Since then he has been a fixture for Valverde until last December 6, in the duel against Atlético in San Mamés, a severe muscle injury occurred in the femoral biceps of his left leg. The Spanish international has been out for two months in which he has missed a dozen games between the League, Champions League, Cup and Super Cup. He returned on Wednesday against Valencia.

With four competitions on the horizon – League, Champions, Cup and Super Cup – he had many numbers to play an important role this season in the red and white core, but everything went wrong last September. He suffered a rupture of the anterior cruciate ligament in his left knee during a training session in Lezama and has only been able to play five preseason friendlies and two League games –Rayo and Betis–. The Navarrese midfielder, one of the long-term injured, is already racing continuously and in his last public appearance, at the EL CORREO awards gala, he assured that, “although there is still recovery work ahead, I hope to be able to help the team in the final stretch of the campaign.”

On November 29, after scoring Athletic’s first goal against Levante in the Ciutat de Valencia after a cross from Berenguer at the start of the match, he had to be substituted after suffering a sprain to the external lateral ligament of his right ankle at the hour mark. The winger was on a roll at the time of his injury and missed a total of five games. After almost 25 days absent from the playing fields, he reappeared in the last league match of 2025 against Espanyol in San Mamés, which ended with a red and white defeat (1-2). He was the least high-profile signing of the three that Athletic made last summer, but the former Real Sociedad, Cádiz and Mallorca player has been able to take advantage of the opportunities to become the team’s second top scorer with 6 goals.

In preseason, Liverpool player Slobozlai fell on his right knee and injured his internal collateral ligament. He avoided surgery, but was out for about a month and a half. He missed the league premiere against Sevilla. In October he did not play against Mallorca at home after it was confirmed that he suffered from a problem with the femoral biceps in his left leg. A month later he was sidelined, due to another muscle problem, against Newcastle away and Oviedo at home. He returned against Barcelona on November 22 but saw a red card and was also unable to face Levante and Real Madrid. Their last setback was against Sporting de Portugal. A new mild-moderate muscle injury in the femoral biceps of his left leg that prevented him from playing against Real and the Cup quarterfinals.

The first problems came in preseason. During a training session in Lezama he suffered a moderate muscle injury in the adductor longus of his right leg. He missed the third and fourth matches of the League against Betis and Alavés. At the end of October he suffered the same ailment again in the clash against Getafe – he was substituted in the 31st minute – and was unable to travel to Anoeta to face Real Sociedad (3-2). It so happens that he has not played in the San Mamés derby against the Txuri Urdin either, having been suspended for two games for his expulsion in Mallorca when he was on the bench. The other punishment match was carried out in the visit to Sánchez Pizjuán against Sevilla, where the rojiblancos lost 2-1.

The red and white winger, whose contract ends in June and has not yet announced his future intentions, suffered an overload in the triceps surae of his right leg on November 4, which prevented him from traveling to St Jame Park to face Newcastle in the Champions League. Subsequently, during Athletic’s visit to Balaídos on December 14, the Zarautz player was substituted in the 51st minute due to a mishap in the hamstring muscles of his right leg that left him out of action for the Cup round of 32 match against Ourense, as well as against Espanyol, Osasuna and Barcelona in the League. The latest setback has once again affected the right hamstring muscles and he also did not travel to Bergamo to participate in the victory against Atalanta.

After completing a great campaign the previous year at Mirandés under the command of Alessio Lisci and given the suspension of Yeray Álvarez after his positive result in the Europa League against Manchester, he had to serve as Athletic’s fourth center back this season. However, everything went wrong for the Durangarra in Muriedas, Cantabria, in preseason, specifically on July 30. That day, Athletic faced Racing in the fourth preparation match and in an incident without apparent danger, they suffered a rupture of the anterior cruciate ligament in their right knee, which left them out for between 6 and 8 months. Goodbye practically the entire season. So far he has missed a total of 34 games between the League, Champions League, Cup and Super Cup.

Other injured: Nico Serrano, Paredes, Unai Gómez and Guruzeta.