Romeo Lavia was forced to come off in the opening minutes of Chelsea's clash against Qarabag at the Tofik Bakhramov Stadium on Wednesday night. The 21-year-old midfielder, who appeared to have suffered a muscle problem, was replaced by Moises Caicedo.
Enzo Maresca had been in the process of slowly reintegrating Lavia, having missed the start of the season due to injury. Speaking to reporters at Cobham on Tuesday ahead of a long-haul trip to Baku, Azerbaijan, the Blues boss provided an update on his fitness.
"The main target for Romeo now is to be fit," said Maresca. "Don't get any injuries. For me, at this moment, Romeo is where Reece was more or less one year ago in terms of back after a long time. We need to manage him every minute, every day, every second.
"And the target with him is just to keep him fit. So, he's training with us. He's OK. He's 100 per cent fit. But, we need to be very careful with him because we don't want him to be out again and finally he can enjoy being a football player."
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Maresca added: "In the Forest game, we planned for him 45 minutes. Then Ajax, I think he played one hour, 70 minutes. The other day against Tottenham, when he was on, he was very good.
"We are happy with Romeo. We are happy with the way he's progressing. And the only thing we want is to keep him fit. So, I would like to have Romeo inside the pitch always. But it's my duty to try to protect also him."
Lavia made his first appearance of the season against Brighton, coming off the bench in the 3-1 defeat. A week later, he enjoyed another promising cameo in Chelsea's dramatic 2-1 win over Liverpool.
Then, after the October international break, the Belgian was awarded his first start of the season. Maresca stepped up Lavia's workload at the end of the month, giving him 60-minute or so outings in the Champions League and the Carabao Cup.
He caught the eye in the final quarter of an hour or so against Tottenham Hotspur on Saturday night, earning himself a place in the starting lineup to face Qarabag.
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