De Bruyne’s face numbs for several months

Kevin De Bruyne was surprised after that Great match against Denmark. “The only concern is that I can no longer feel the left part of my face,” he said after the surgery and his nose and eye socket fracture. “The nerve has been injured and it looks like you’re numb at the dentist. It could take another six months. You can play with it, but it’s just annoying.”

What should we imagine? A survey conducted by some Flemish neurologists gives mostly tentative answers, because they do not know this specific case of De Bruyne. ‘The fact that he has been told that the numbness will go away after a few months makes me suspect that the peripheral sensory nerve has been affected,’ says sports physician Luk Buyse, head of the VUB Research Group in Human Physiology. “Fortunately, the nerve has not been cut, and the consequences will be worse.”

Purely scientifically, the branches of the fifth main nerve (trigeminal) are said to be affected. The result is already in that spot the face is numb. De Bruyne doesn’t have to worry: This should be gone within a few months.