Manchester United suffer major injury setback

Diogo Dalot has been an ever-present for Man United for the best part of three-and-a-half years since he returned from his loan with AC Milan.

Manchester United defender Diogo Dalot has been ruled out of their upcoming matches with a calf injury.

Dalot was not visible in the imagery and footage released from United's training session on Wednesday and he could miss the rest of the season.

The 26-year-old suffered the injury after he came on in the 1-0 defeat to Wolves on Sunday. It marks the first injury that Dalot has sustained since January 2023. Dalot started in 31 of United's 33 Premier League games and missed one fixture through suspension. Dalot started in 35 of United's 38 league matches last term.

Amad is nearing a return from an ankle injury and United hope to have Matthijs de Ligt back soon. Amad has been sidelined for more than two months while De Ligt has missed the last five games with a foot injury.

When asked if Dalot could not play again this term, United coach Ruben Amorim said: "There is that possibility but I don’t know. We will check week by week because he works really hard, he can recover quite well. We’ll see.

"He has something in his muscle, his calf, he had a sequence of games, he played all the time, we try to manage but the players play a lot of minutes and not so ready to cope with that. Dalot felt something.

"We don’t know how long he’s going to be out. But he's out for these next games. Amad is near, Mattha is near but the rest is at the same pace. Ayden (Heaven) is not ready, so that’s it."

Dalot's absence could see Patrick Dorgu switch to the right wing, with Harry Amass a potential option on the left wing after his starts against Newcastle United and Wolves.

Noussair Mazraoui played on the right wing under Amorim before Dorgu came in but the Moroccan has slotted in at centre back in recent weeks.

Amorim is set to select a strong side at Bournemouth on Sunday to maintain United starters' match rhythm heading into their Europa League semi-final first leg against Athletic Bilbao on Thursday.

"The focus is we have to face it and we need to have that feeling that every game here is important and we have to win every game because that is the feeling, that it's important not to lose, you can see the context.

"We are going to face this game with the best team, we had a full week to prepare. Some of the players didn’t play against Wolverhampton so sometimes if you recover so much the players it's a bad thing.

"I will try to manage everything to win this game and prepare for this game and try and win the next one.

"What I’m saying with our current squad, you have to take a risk and choose a priority. I want to put the best players, the best starting XI, in every game and sometimes it’s hard for me to take a risk in the Premier League. Because sometimes the games in the Premier League are tougher than the Europa League.

"But in this moment we have to make choices and I also want to protect the young players. I don’t want to put everybody together in the same game in a way that they can’t perform."