Erik Lamela misses Argentina training with injury, status for Colombia, Spurs unknown

You wanna know why we at Cartilage Free Captain hate the international break? This is why we hate the international break. Yesterday news broke that Tottenham Hotspur's Erik Lamela missed two days of training with his Argentinian national teammates due to a muscular strain he picked up in practice. He is now doubtful for Argentina's World Cup qualifier against Columbia this evening.

Let's preface this with the usual caveats: we don't really know anything about Lamela's injury. Various reports have categorized it as a "muscle strain" but we have no idea as to its severity or how long Lamela might be out, if at all. His sitting out of training might be precautionary, or it might be symptomatic of a larger issue. Obviously, we won't know much until he returns to Tottenham to have their physios look at him, and considering how tight-lipped Spurs are with their injury news we might not know anything even then.

The good news is that it doesn't really effect Spurs heading into this weekend's match against West Ham. Lamela will already miss the match via suspension after picking up his fifth yellow card of the season in Spurs' North London Derby draw at the Emirates. If anything, this will give him some extra time to recuperate and heal up in time for the Chelsea match. But we all hope it's nothing serious, considering how solid Lamela has been for Spurs the past several matches.

Collomosse's report isn't all bad news, though – after a solid 45 minutes for Algeria this weekend, Nabil Bentaleb appears ready to be reintegrated back into Spurs' match-day squad. This is welcome news, though I wouldn't expect to necessarily see him start against West Ham, considering Pochettino's propensity to gradually work injured players back into the side.