The frightening reason why Wasps have booked Matteo Minozzi in for unexpected surgery

11:30am, 21 April 2021

Wasps full-back Matteo Minozzi is set to be out of action until the last few weeks of the Gallagher Premiership season in June after a worrying partial tear of his retina was diagnosed when a doctor was checking him out for something else.

The Italian last played for the English club in their Heineken Champions Cup round of 16 loss to Clermont on April 4, but Wasps are at a loss as to when and how the eye injury actually occurred.

Its severity is that it could have caused Minozzi blindness if he played on without it being detected, so Wasps have lined the 24-year-old up for an operation as soon as possible to get the problem sorted out.

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“Matteo has had a partial tear of his retina so he is going to need a bit of surgery on that,” revealed Wasps boss Lee Blackett at his midweek media briefing ahead of next Sunday’s game at home to Bath.

“He could be six weeks, unfortunately. It was a strange one. He just saw the doctor about something and they scanned him and found it, so we don’t actually know when it happened. It’s not in an incident that that has happened.

"No player likes being left out…"
– It has been a difficult few months for Matteo Minozzi after he made himself unavailable for Italy and then lost his place at Wasps #WASvASM #HeinekenChampionsCup https://t.co/qWrPgePYT0
— RugbyPass (@RugbyPass) April 2, 2021

“It came down to the thing of Matteo really wanted to carry on but we were talking about it to someone and if you don’t have this surgery you risk being blind in one eye. It’s nothing something that sits well with any of us. As soon as the blind conversation started happening everyone realised where we have to go,” Blackett continued.

“It’s Matteo’s health that is important and the last thing you want to do is get him through a few games and then in a few weeks’ time, he goes blind in one eye. It’s not something that sits well.”

Lee Blackett is not happy after Wasps embarrassingly capitulated after a strong first half. https://t.co/zWKO21fn95
— RugbyPass (@RugbyPass) April 17, 2021