Eden Hazard has picked up an untimely hamstring injury, with the Belgian set to see his competitive debut for Real Madrid delayed.
The Blancos are set to open their 2019-20 La Liga campaign away at Celta Vigo on Saturday.
Hazard, fresh from a €100 million (£88m/$112m) transfer to Santiago Bernabeu from Chelsea, would have been hoping to figure prominently in that fixture.
He is, however, set to be restricted to a spectator role after suffering an unfortunate knock.
Real have confirmed that the 28-year-old is facing up to a spell on the sidelines.
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A statement on the club’s official website read: “After the tests carried out after training today by the Real Madrid Medical Services, our player Eden Hazard has been diagnosed with a lesion in the anterior rectus of the left thigh.”
Goal has learned that Hazard will be ruled out for between three and four weeks.
If that proves to be the case, then he will be missing for Madrid until after the first international break of the 2019-20 campaign.
Before domestic football shuts down, Real are due to take in meetings with Celta, Real Valladolid and Villarreal.
A home date with Levante is due to be staged on September 14, with it possible that Hazard could come back into contention for that contest.
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For now, though, Zinedine Zidane is going to have to favour other attacking options.
He has seen the likes of Gareth Bale and James Rodriguez spark endless rounds of transfer talk this summer, but the pair may now have an important role to play.
Zidane has said on Bale: “It seemed that he was going, but now he is with us.
“Things change and now I will be using him as much as the other players in the squad. I'm going to use all the players I've got.
“He is registered with us and he is a good player. I hope all the players here want to make things difficult for me.”
The Blancos boss added on Colombia international James: “He is fit and we are happy to have him in the squad.
“I'll repeat what I said before - I have a big squad and I'll use all the players. They're all happy to be here.”