Gareth Bale Forced to Miss Wales's Last World Cup Qualifiers With Calf Injury
Real Madrid superstar Gareth Bale has seen injury catch up with him yet again after being ruled out of Wales' crucial World Cup qualifiers against Georgia and Republic of Ireland this week.
Bale suffered a calf strain during Real's Champions League win over Borussia Dortmund last week, a disappointing end to an otherwise impressive night for the winger.
That forced him to sit out of the weekend's La Liga fixture against Espanyol and that muscular problem has now seen him pull out of international duty as well.
Wales currently sit second behind Serbia in Group D of the World Cup qualifying standings. More importantly, they are bottom of the rankings when it comes to the nine second placed teams, with only eight to get another chance of reaching Russia in the playoff round.
That means Wales realistically need to win both of their remaining two games, not only to stay above the Republic of Ireland in second place, but to have any chance of climbing the second place rankings or potentially even catch Serbia and qualify automatically.
The latter scenario seems unlikely as the leaders, who can guarantee first place with one win from either of their remaining games, face lowly Georgia at home in their final fixture.
With Wales needing to win, Bale will be a big miss for his country.
The extra rest may prove beneficial to Real, though, as Bale will have almost two weeks to recover and prepare himself for Los Blancos next outing against Getafe on 14th October.
