Chelsea boss Graham Potter has confirmed N’golo Kante will be out for at least two more months following his hamstring surgery.
Kante missed the World Cup in Qatar as a consequence of the injury, and the Chelsea head coach explained that the Frenchman is still some way off from making a return. Kante’s services is no doubt a blow to Potter, especially given the growing list of injury absentees at Stamford Bridge.
Potter said: “He will be a while, end of Feb, start of March,” Potter said in his press conference prior to welcoming Bournemouth in the Premier League on December 27. It was a surgery, so it is a minimum period of four months pretty much. I think my focus is to help him get back fit as soon as possible, everyone knows the quality he has. That is not in question, but it is about helping him get fit and back on the pitch, and looking forward to seeing him back playing football as we haven’t seen him”.
Kante’s future at Stamford Bridge is in doubt with his current contract due to expire next June. Goalkeeper Edouard Mendy has also been linked with a move away from West London, with the Senegalese shot-stopper reportedly unhappy at the new terms he was offered – suggestions which Potter refused to comment on.
Potter in an interview commented: “It’s not my place to speak publicly about players’ contract situations. That’s between them and the club,” Potter added.
“He’s been top with us, with me, great guy, happy around the place. In terms of his contract it’s not for me to comment. There was some positive news concerning Reece James, who is now available for selection after recovering from a knee injury which ruled him out of England’s World Cup squad. Meanwhile, Armando Broja, Wesley Fofana, Ruben Loftus-Cheek and Ben Chilwell are the confirmed absentees in a busy treatment room. Wesley just had a little setback which can sometimes happen at the very last stage of the rehab. It will be a couple of weeks so he won’t be available for the game. Obviously, Armando is a big loss in terms of the time he is out. Reece is back in and completed 65 minutes in the week, still without Ruben, still without Ben Chilwell, obviously Kante. Mendy has had a couple of days training with us. Chelsea’s focus now is their match against Bournemouth, and Potter is eager for a reaction from his side as the Blues seek to end a sobering run of three consecutive defeats.
“Well, it’s always nice to win that’s for sure. We know the situation; we know how important it is. We want to try our best. I think you have to go through moments. We were suffering a bit before the break in terms of results that weren’t what we wanted and performances weren’t so good either. Sometimes as a team you go through these periods. We went through one there and I could offer lots of explanations as to why. You just have to accept sometimes they happen and you have to get through them and a break can help whether it’s an international break or different competition. We had the break, some guys went away to the World Cup, everyone can come back and reset. All of the learning that has happened in that really intense period you can consolidate and say ‘OK, how do we go forward?’ and that has been beneficial.”