Enzo Maresca has confirmed Reece James will miss Chelsea’s trip to Leicester City and provided an update on the situation when it comes to the rest of the Blues squad.
The Blues return to Premier League action this weekend, taking on Steve Cooper’s Foxes at the King Power Stadium – Maresca’s former club – in the early kick-off on Saturday.
Speaking at his pre-match press conference at Cobham, our head coach confirmed skipper James won’t be risked after suffering a small hamstring complaint and said he will have to assess the fitness of some of the other players ahead of the trip to the East Midlands.
Maresca said: ‘We have, for sure, just one injured player and that is Reece. Unfortunately, he felt something small and we do not want to take a risk with him at the weekend. He is the only one for sure who is not available for this weekend.
‘The rest, some of them are better and some of them are a doubt, plus we need to wait because today is the first session we do with all of the players from international duty so we will see after today’s session.’
He added: ‘It is his hamstring with Reece, so a muscle problem. We don’t want to take any risk with this weekend so hopefully it is not something long.’
Cole Palmer and Levi Colwill were two of the players who had to withdraw from international duty over the last two weeks, with Wesley Fofana, Malo Gusto and Filip Jorgensen others who were unable to feature for their countries having initially been called up.
Maresca was asked specifically about Colwill and Palmer and explained he hadn’t been part of any conversations with the England set-up.
‘To be honest, after we played Arsenal I left for one week [on holiday] so I don’t know about the conversations between the club and the international teams,’ Maresca said.
When asked if Palmer and Colwill were ok, our head coach added: ‘As I said, some of them are better, some we will test today. But overall, for sure, they are much better.’
Chelsea’s talented squad includes the likes of Argentina’s Enzo Fernandez and Ecuador’s Moises Caicedo, who travelled to South America for World Cup qualifiers and will take part in their first Chelsea training session since returning to England this afternoon.
Maresca explained how such journeys will inevitably have an impact on their fitness levels and bodies, saying: ‘For sure, the ones that are going to play [against Leicester] are not going to be 100 per cent because they are human beings and when you play two games in South America and you have to play again, even if you are 20 to 25 years old, it doesn’t matter and you are tired because you are a human being. But hopefully we can find the right balance [in our midfield].’