Team News: Chelsea hopeful that midfield general will be available to face Fulham

Chelsea hopeful that Mateo Kovacic among others return for the Fulham game

According to Evening Standard, Chelsea are hopeful that midfielder Mateo Kovacic returns to full fitness when they next take the field against Fulham on February 3 (Friday).

The Croatia international was surprisingly not in the squad for the Liverpool game at Anfield. Chelsea boss Graham Potter later cleared it up that he had an issue with his calf after the Crystal Palace game.

With no FA Cup or Carabao Cup game in between due to early eliminations, Chelsea have a 13-day gap between the Liverpool and Fulham game. It is probably enough time for Kovacic to return to full fitness, and also allow the likes of Reece James, Ben Chilwell and Ruben Loftus-Cheek, who were back in training last week, to spend more time on the training field with the squad.

The club also hopes that this gap will also allow the likes of Raheem Sterling and Wesley Fofana to return from their injuries. The former picked up an injury during the league game against Manchester City earlier this month, while the latter’s return from injury dealt a setback with another issue during the mid-season friendly against Brentford.

If the encouraging performance against Liverpool was not good enough in terms of the news, these updates about the potential return of players are adding to it.

If the above-mentioned six players return by the next game or two, in addition to Joao Felix’s return to action from suspension after the Fulham game, Potter will have a nearly full squad to pick his teams from.

That can have a positive impact on our chase for the top four and making a deep run in the Champions League. There is still a lot of football to be played in the league.

More Chelsea News:

• Chelsea planning a new push to sign Benfica midfielder Enzo Fernandez
• Chelsea target Jude Bellingham to turn down new contract offer from Dortmund
• Marc Cucurella praises Mykhailo Mudryk for his impactful Chelsea debut

We can hope that the return of key players brings consistency to the performance and positive results. Once the momentum is gained, it would be difficult to stop us from making a late raid for the fourth spot in the table.