The Philadelphia Union’s bad luck continued as midfielder Maurice Edu, signed to a Designated Player contract in 2014 and given a multi-year extension in 2015, will miss 3-4 months whilerecovering from a stress fracture in his left leg. Coach Jim Curtin described the injury as “a big blow to a lot of the foundation that we planned to do this year in terms of having himat the No. 6 role.”
Edu had moved back and forth between midfield and the backline since joining the Union from England’s Stoke City in early 2014. He’s played in 53 leaguegames with the Union and helped it reach back-to-back U.S. Open Cup finals.
Edu underwent surgery for a sports hernia in October and was believed to have suffered a stress reaction whilerehabilitating.
“It’s been a frustrating process, I think, for everybody involved in terms of finding a diagnosis,” Curtin said at the Union’s Wednesday pressconference. “A lot of things don’t show up on MRIs or bone scans. We finally got to the bottom of it though and the X-ray revealed there was a fracture there.”
For the 2016opener, a 2-0 loss at FC Dallas, veteran Brian Carroll started in the central midfield position.