Enzo Maresca took his press conference last night ahead of tonight’s game against Atalanta, and one of the questions was on the injury to Liam Delap.
The striker has hurt his shoulder, and will be out for a month or more. That prompted questions about whether a Chelsea outcast, Raheem Sterling, would be brought back into the fold.
Maresca forced to answer yet more awkward questions about frozen out winger
Enzo Maresca teaches Raheem Sterling on the pitch.
Enzo Maresca teaches Raheem Sterling on the pitch.
“Liam, as I said at the beginning, fortunately he’s not got any fracture,” the manager said of his main striker.
“That is good news for us. Now for how long he will be out, not sure to be honest. And then in terms of Raheem, once again it’s the same thing I said about Axel [Disasi], they are Chelsea players. Now also we are in December, January is coming, so anything can happen. We’ll see.”
Well, we’ll take that as a no then… It sounds like Maresca is counting the days until January so a deal to move Sterling on can quickly be done so that the manager doesn’t have to answer any more questions about him.
On a practical level, there shouldn’t really be any need for Sterling, given the club have really committed to freezing him out at this point. Facundo Buonanotte is hanging around and can’t even get in the squad at the moment, it will take a few more injuries before Sterling is even considered.
In other news…
Alejandro Garnacho is likely to start tonight, and we’d love a big performance from him. He’s done well, but as Enzo Maresca has said, there’s certainly more to come from the summer signing.
Also in that press conference, Maresca effectively ruled out two players from the game tonight, for different reasons.
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A generic view of Stamford Bridge.
The East Stand entrace at Stamford Bridge. (Photo by Warren Little/Getty Images)
Nico O'Reilly in action for England.