Sean Everitt has confirmed Edinburgh will be without Emiliano Boffelli for at least the next few weeks after he underwent a procedure on his back.
The Argentine suffered back spasms while in South Africa for the URC games against Stormers and Sharks and was a late withdrawal from the first of those defeats.
He was sent to London for tests this week and Everitt has now revealed that he will be out of action for a while, although they are unable to put a timescale on it.
They are confident it will be weeks rather than months for Boffelli though and the 29-year-old will be back before long.
He said: “Boff had a small procedure on Friday and it shouldn’t keep him out too long so that’s a positive for us.
“It will be weeks but we’ll have to see how quickly he responds. He had the same procedure last year and responded pretty quickly to it so we are hoping for the same outcome.”
Everitt watched his side defeat Bayonne at Scottish Gas Murrayfield after the game had been moved from the Hive due to Storm Kathleen’s high winds.
The French side aren’t great travellers having not won on the road at all this season, but the Edinburgh head coach insists his side need to be delighted with the result.
It comes after back to back to defeats in South Africa and Everitt revealed there were some important talks held following those games before they flew back to Scotland on Monday.
He added: “Bayonne made 13 changes to the team that played last Sunday night [v Toulon] but it was a very similar team to the one that beat Exeter and drew with Munster so we can’t underestimate the magnitude of this win, even though it’s at home.
“We had some hard conversations on Monday and we spoke about individual preparation and we spoke about team preparation. We get our team preparation right most weeks and it’s the individual errors that creep in which let us down.
“That was a focus for us, that individuals need to switch on mentally during the week and understand their roles and carry that through into the team situation and I thought they did much better with regards to that and it just makes life a lot easier.”
Ben Vellacott scored two tries on the night but he took a sore hit after scoring the first, with Yan Lestrade shown a yellow card for his hit on the head of the Edinburgh scrum-half.
There was a bit of concern for Vellacott after it with such a big hit but Everitt dismissed any concerns and was delighted with how he performed.
He said: “He’s OK. It was dangerous play and you don’t want to lose a player after he’s scored a try like that but I thought the ref handled it well so no complaints.
“It’s good to see him getting some time on the field. He’s had four starts in a row now and it helps build confidence. It also helps Gilco [Grant Gilchrist] coming back with the captaincy.
“He was really sharp with the [first] try he scored and also very clever with the second one when the forwards were picking and going.”
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