Maresca admits he’s “worried” about potential injuries; but hints at strong team | OneFootball

Enzo Maresca has just taken his press conference ahead of Chelsea’s Conference League semi final against Djurgarden away in Sweden tomorrow.

One of the first questions was about the 4G pitch that his team will play on in the 3Arena in Stockholm tomorrow night. His answer about the pitch actually said a lot more about the team he might pick tomorrow:

“For sure [the artificial pitch] it can be a concern. I’m a little bit worried about that but we are not in a moment where we can decide to save players for Sunday. This is a European semi-final.”

Maresca hints at fewer changes than expected

Enzo Maresca in Chelsea’s press conference ahead of Conference League semi.

We had assumed that Maresca would be picking his usual, heavily rotated team, with perhaps 9 or 10 changes from the side to take on Liverpool this weekend.

But clearly he’s heading more in the direction he did against Legia Warsaw in the last round – trying to win the game in the first leg and then take it easier in the second.

There was another clue from first team midfielder Moises Caicedo, who is probably top of the list of players we’d like to leave out of tomorrow’s game, given Liverpool are coming up this weekend. He said in an interview on the club’s website how excited he was to play, hinting he would be featuring in the game.

Maresca not ready to take risks despite lowly opposition

It all seems rather unnecessary given we’re facing a team sitting in 11th in the Swedish league, with 1/44th of our budget. But that’s the problem with coaches – Enzo Maresca is naturally thinking about his personal trophy cabinet and keeping his job, and not necessarily about the big picture.

We can only imagine the blowback if we lose a big player to an injury from the plastic pitch.