Maurizio Sarri provided an injury update on N’Golo Kante, reflected on a season of working in the right direction and warned against the threats of Eintracht Frankfurt as he looked ahead to our Europa League semi-final second leg against the Germans at Stamford Bridge on Thursday evening.
The boss reported that Kante would miss the Frankfurt game and our final domestic fixture of the season away at Leicester City, the midfielder’s former club, but indicated he could be back for the European final if the Blues make it to Baku. Kante limped off early on in our weekend win over Watford.
‘He had a problem with his hamstring,’ reported Sarri at his pre-match press conference. ‘It was not very serious but he needs to rest for a couple of weeks. We can try to recover him for the final if we make it.’
Following a 1-1 draw in Germany, Sarri was asked whether his side were semi-final favourites given the away goal scored by Pedro.
‘It’s not easy because we have to play a dangerous team, as we saw in the first leg,. They are dynamic, aggressive and dangerous in the offensive phase, especially when they find space in counter-attacks, so it’s a dangerous match.
‘In a semi-final, you always have to play against a strong team with strong players so it’s difficult to say we are favourites. They have two good strikers in [Luka] Jovic and [Ante] Rebic so we have to be careful.’
