Reports over the past week regarding Cole Palmer’s groin injury had been fairly promising, but Enzo Maresca dialed back some of that optimism in his pre-match press conference on Friday, revealing that Palmer had yet to train fully and that his level of involvement will be a gametime decision. I’m guessing that will mean that Palmer starts on the bench.
That uncertainty played into this week’s lineup voting as well, though Palmer still edges out his two closest competitors, Jamie Gittens (30%) and Alejandro Garnacho (28%). Gittens has not had a standout moment yet in Chelsea Blue and Garnacho just got here; so Cole it is!
The other close battle was at right back, where Maresca has been preferring Malo Gusto over Reece James, 2-to-1 thus far. For the people however, it’s the Captain who wins out by a few percentage points, 55-to-50.
The rest are essentially unchanged from the last two games prior to the international break. With games now starting to come thick and fast, we’ll see how the manager handles the rotation. It won’t be as easy as last year with the Conference League cupcakes!
4-2-3-1 (82%)
Sánchez (95%) | Cucurella (82%), Chalobah (81%), Tosin (94%), James (55%) | Enzo (88%), Caicedo (77%) | Estêvão (76%), Palmer (37%), Neto (88%) | João Pedro (89%)
Andrey Santos got a respectable 39% as well, while Marc Guiu reached the 25% mark. Jorrel Hato (18%), Wesley Fofana (17%), and Josh Acheampong (13%) split the rest of the defensive votes. Facundo Buonanotte (9%) and Tyrique George (6%) were non-factors.
