Sky: Antonio Conte returning to England, will rejoin Tottenham training on Thursday

Antonio Conte watched Tottenham Hotspur defeat Manchester City from his home in Italy on Sunday after having emergency gallbladder surgery earlier in the week. Today, it looks like he’s returning to the UK. Sky Sports is reporting that Conte will fly to London today after a period of recovery from surgery and will rejoin Spurs training on Thursday.

So this tells us a couple of things. First, Conte’s surgery was laparoscopic in nature and minimally invasive, which implies that his gallbladder didn’t rupture. Had he had traditional surgery, he’d still be in recovery for a few more weeks. That he’s back after just over a week implies that everything went well and that the surgery itself was routine. That’s good!

Secondly, it tells us that he now could very well be back on the sidelines for Saturday’s match against Leicester at the King Power. My guess is that if he is, he won’t be back to his usual bombastic self for a while yet (maybe he won’t even leave the dugout) but he’ll at minimum be physically present to give direction and instruction. And hey, Cristian Stellini did a pretty good impression of Conte at times last Sunday. If Conte needs to sit down and let his lieutenant do the gesticulating and pointing, well, that all sounds fine.

In all seriousness, surgery is rarely something to take lightly, especially emergency surgery. I’m glad Conte is back and well, and hope that he’s able to do everything he needs to do within the confines of his continued recovery.