Fulham FC captain and USMNT veteran Tim Ream will miss Fulham’s final five Premier League games this season, after breaking his arm early in the Cottagers’ narrow loss to Manchester City on Sunday.
The 35 year-old central defender went down shortly past the quarter-hour mark, falling on his right arm and eventually leaving the field of play in a sling after several minutes of on-field treatment.
After the game, Fulham head coach Marco Silva confirmed that the injury was indeed a broken arm, and will end what has been Ream’s most successful season in England several weeks earlier than planned.
“Tim Ream is probably not playing any more this season, he’s broken his arm,” Silva clarified in the post-game press conference.
Even though the Cottagers ended up narrowly losing the game to the reigning and likely repeat league champions, they are still in a safe spot despite the loss of their team captain.
Currently in tenth place, they have a 16-point lead over the first relegation spot, making their survival already a mathematical certainty, no matter what happens in the coming weeks. This guarantees them consecutive seasons in the top flight for the first time since their relegation following the 2013-14 season.
Ream has been one of Fulham’s biggest surprises in their remarkable season, starting all 33 of the team’s Premier League games prior to the injury, while scoring his first-ever top-flight goal. This led to his return to the USMNT, where he started all four of the team’s games in Qatar.
It is currently unclear whether he will be fit in time to participate in the CONCACAF Nations League Finals in mid-June, where the USMNT plays archrivals Mexico in the semifinal on June 15, or in CONCACAF Gold Cup beginning several days later.
