LONDON: Ahead of the FA Cup third-round tie against Morecambe, Chelsea manager Frank Lampard on Friday confirmed that midfielder N'Golo Kante will miss the clash due to a hamstring injury.
After being hit by injury last season, Kante had stayed fit until now, but he joins Reece James and Andreas Christensen on the injured list.
"I am not going to talk about the starting line-up for Morecambe but Reece James is out of the game although he will be training with us tomorrow, but the game comes too early," the club's official website quoted Lampard as saying.
"The same as Andreas Christensen and N'Golo Kante, who is out also with a minor hamstring injury so he misses this game and he is suspended for Fulham next Friday anyway. So we will get him right," he added.
Christensen's problem stems from a collision with Jack Grealish which left him down in the build-up to Aston Villa's equaliser in the 1-1 draw at Stamford Bridge on 28 December.
"The injury was absolutely from that moment in the Villa game and there was probably a typical modern-day reaction where Andreas took stick for it, but he is out injured,' pointed out Lampard. The injury isn't too bad which is good news so he will be back training with us tomorrow," the boss said.
Lampard named five Academy youngsters who have been training with the senior players at Cobham this week and explained how that is possible and why it is of big benefit to him.
"We have called up both Tinos - Anjorin and Livramento, and Jude Soonsup-Bell who has been scoring goals in the youth team. We have called up Lewis Bate who has trained with us before and we have called up Henry Lawrence," Lampard said.
"It is a great experience for them. It is something I wanted to do and was able to do at the club last year pre-restart. It helps training because it is really important to have competitive training and having young numbers allows that without killing the players physically between games," he added.