David Alaba still wants to play for Austria, even with broken rib

Yet another international break has dawned on us, which means the majority of the players in Bayern Munich’s squad will be off playing for their national teams. There was already a bit of a rift between Bayern’s front office and the French federation over Lucas Hernandez’s involvement with Les Bleus during the break due to his knee injury, but now Bayern will also have to keep close tabs on David Alaba.

Per a report by kicker, Alaba still wants, and plans, to play for Austria despite having a broken rib, which he sustained in the first half of Bayern’s 7-2 win over Tottenham in the Champions League. Austria have a pair of Euro 2020 qualifiers against Israel and then Slovenia and could potentially jump to 2nd, or even 1st place in qualifying group G if they win both matches and depending on how results go elsewhere in the group. Bayern did not protest Alaba travelling to Vienna to meet up with the national team, and the defender is hopeful that he can play a part for his country in either, or both, of the qualifiers:

Of course I hope that things develop as I imagine in the next 24 to 48 hours.

Photo by Marc Atkins/Getty Images

Alaba playing with a broken rib is, of course, a bit of a roll of the dice, but it’s telling that Bayern’s front office didn’t object his involvement with Austria at all after expressing their frustration with Hernandez joining up with the French squad. Perhaps they feel less concern with Alaba aggravating his rib while away with Austrian than they do with Hernandez re-injuring his knee that had the ACL tear last year. Regardless, they’ll be keeping their fingers crossed in the hopes that Alaba stays fully fit through this international break.