Fulham
Fulham’s Calvin Bassey will miss Nigeria’s matches this month after suffering a setback.
The centre-back will return to London, to work on his recovery with the Premier League side.
Fulham signed him from Ajax for €21m in July 2023 and he has been a regular since then.
The 26-year-old has so far played 94 matches for Marco Silva’s side and 2,018 minutes are from 25 matches from this season.
Bassey’s stats per game from the Premier League are as follows:
Interceptions: 0.7
Tackles: 2.0
Clearances: 3.5
Ball recovered: 4.0
Dribbled past: 0.3
Duels won: 4.9
The player has been a regular for the national team since moving to Fulham and Nigeria manager Éric Chelle called him up for the ongoing international break.
Lack of clarity on Fulham man’s injury
The Nigerian football association took to X, formerly known as Twitter, to confirm Fulham defender Calvin Bassey’s setback. Trabzonspor’s Chibuike Nwaiwu will take his place in the squad to face Iran later today.
The post also includes a creative showing Nwaiwu ‘in’ and Bassey ‘out’ and that’s ‘due to an injury’. There has been no further communication around the former Ajax man’s setback.
In other words, the Nigerian FA haven’t given any information on the nature of the injury, how he suffered this setback and how long he could be out on the sidelines. Own Goal Nigeria are reporting his withdrawal was due to a back injury.
The defender will now likely return to Fulham, who will carry out further tests. Marco Silva’s side should provide an update on his injury situation in the next few days.
Fulham’s next fixture is against Liverpool at Anfield on April 11th and Silva would hope for the Nigerian to be fit for this clash.
Bassey also needs to soon regain fitness if he wishes to secure a move elsewhere in the summer. Earlier in the season, his club teammate, Kenny Tete, said Fulham aren’t his final destination.
🇳🇱 Ricardo Pepi | Player left ‘severely disappointed’ by Fulham ➡️ Attitude might have changed drasticallyhttps://t.co/ywyBqCqKK8 #ffc #fulhamfc
— Sport Witness (@Sport_Witness) March 25, 2026