James, Caicedo, Lavia, Palmer: Maresca confirms Chelsea team news for Bournemouth trip | OneFootball

Enzo Maresca confirmed Chelsea will be close to full strength for Saturday's visit to Bournemouth, with Moises Caicedo and three injured players the only ones expected to miss the trip.

Maresca decided to leave Wesley Fofana out of the squad and Reece James on the bench in Wednesday's clash with Leeds United, and paid the price for it.

The Chelsea head coach already explained that both Fofana and James are still not capable of playing three games in a week without risking injuries, but the pair should be available for the weekend.

"Just Moi is suspended, and we don't have any new injury," the Italian said in Friday's press conference when speaking about the team ahead of the Bournemouth trip.

Caicedo will miss two more domestic games for Chelsea for his red card in the draw with Arsenal, but he will at least be in contention to play against Atalanta in the Champions League on Tuesday.

The Blues have three remaining players on their injury list: Levi Colwill, Dario Essugo, and Romeo Lavia.

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About Lavia's injury, he added: "It's a muscular problem, and we don't know yet when he can be back."

Lavia sustained his current injury during the early minutes of Chelsea's draw with Qarabag in the Champions League last month.

His presence would have helped Chelsea cope with Caicedo's absence, and so would Essugo's.

Essugo made his return to Chelsea training ahead of Arsenal, but as Maresca revealed a few days ago, the Chelsea summer signing suffered a setback in training and is ruled out for the next three games as well.

This means Maresca will most likely have to rely on Andrey Santos for the number six role against Bournemouth on Saturday and Everton next week.

Alternative number six options would be one of the defenders, such as Reece James, Malo Gusto, or Josh Acheampong.

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On a more positive note, Palmer is closer to being at 100 per cent and is expected to be involved again at Vitality Stadium.

"Probably the only good news of the night," Maresca said about Palmer's return in Chelsea's defeat to Leeds.

"You know, happy for him. He's back. Now he needs to build a little bit of physical condition, and he will be important for us for sure."

"He's getting better, but he needs to play minutes," Maresca added about Palmer's condition.

"Tonight we (gave) him more or less half an hour. Hopefully, we can give him more in the next game."