Mateo Kovacic has not started for Chelsea in their last two Premier League games against Brentford and Manchester United.
The Croatian international has come on as a substitute in those two games. He was replaced by Conor Gallagher in the first half against Brentford and came on in the second half against Manchester United.
However, Graham Potter has revealed that Mateo Kovacic is still nursing his knee injury and he is not fully fit.
What did Graham Potter say?
The Chelsea manager said at a Press conference after Chelsea’s 1-1 draw with Manchester United: “He’s been nursing his knee for all season pretty much and you look at the schedule, it’s Sunday-Wednesday-Saturday and it’s impossible for him to start all the games.
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“We’ve planned for him to have less time than he has but things have conspired so he has been on the pitch. We all know his quality but at the same time, we’ve got to understand the player’s situation as well.”
Meanwhile, Chelsea midfielder Ruben Loftus- Check has revealed that the 1-1 draw with Manchester United feels like a defeat.
Ruben Loftus- Check said: “It was scrappy, both teams weren’t clean on the ball.
“It was just one of those games but I thought we had it [the win], we were defending well, and then to be honest I don’t know how Casemiro’s got the power on that header to send it up and down. It feels like a defeat.”
He added: “There are two sides to the game and you have to do both if you want to be a good team. We want to match any team that comes here and it was unlucky for us to concede in the last minute. But we’re not losing, we’re winning and we are drawing which is a good sign.”
“We want to be solid as a team first, that’s the foundation going forward. You want to be good defensively and then on top of that have the freedom and a flow to go and score goals and create. That’s the next step.”
Ben Chilwell has hailed Jorginho Penalty scoring ability.
The Chelsea left-back said: “Jorgi is the coolest guy in the room, especially when it comes to penalties and I think it’s something you’re either born with or not,’ he added. ‘You’ve seen it time and time again. His Chelsea record with penalties is magnificent and again he delivered.
“We’ve got full confidence in him when he steps up to take the penalty and the way he does it is brilliant so long may it continue that he performs for us in that respect.
“We’ve got a really good mentality and we’re very confident going into games at the moment. Even if you look at the first 30 minutes today, we defended well, we were together as a unit and solid.
“I think that’s something we’ve brought on leaps and bounds since the manager came in – the defensive togetherness, we’re keeping clean sheets and we nearly kept another one today. We just need to keep building on that, keep that defensive unit strong as a whole team and then build from there.”
