Chelsea will take on Manchester United for their Premier League this Sunday at Old Trafford and it looks like N’Golo Kante will not be available for this game.
The midfielder has mostly been fit during the past season but he did miss some games in May due to a combination of hamstring and knee injuries.
But he picked up a fresh injury during Chelsea’s pre-season tour in Japan which forced him to return back to London for further treatment.
Initially, there were rumours that N’Golo Kante could miss the first few games of the new season but Frank Lampard late last month claimed that the Frenchman has a shot of making himself fit for the opener vs Man United.
“I am hopeful he will be ready,” Lampard said.
“He’s dipped into training with us in the last couple of days. There’s still a lot more he needs to do physically without us. But the signs are good.
“I’ll have to assess next week whether we throw him straight in. He has a natural base of fitness but there’s 50- or 60-odd games to come this season. We have to be slightly careful.”
And keeping in line with the new manager’s statement, N’Golo Kante managed to take part in Chelsea’s final pre-season game which was an indication that he will start in midfield this Sunday.
Now though, the manager has spoken the worse claiming that the World Cup winner might not be match fit to be handed a starting role at Old Trafford.
‘”We have Kante fit, whether we have him match fit I’m not sure. Rudiger and Willian have been training, but possibly Sunday is too soon for him.” the manager said.
If it happens then it will surely be a huge blow for Frank Lampard since Mateo Kovacic is the like-to-like replacement for N’Golo Kante and the former La Liga man is not the ideal player when it comes to defending against counter-attacks.
