Carlo Ancelotti will be without Ramires for the Spartak Moscow game, after the midfielder picked up a knock on his ankle in Saturday's goalless draw with Aston Villa.
The Brazilian travelled to Russia but will not be fully recovered in time and will return to England for treatment, where he will join Alex, Jose Bosingwa, Didier Drogba and Frank Lampard.
Despite these absences Ancelotti feels he will be able to field a strong side against Spartak in the Luzhniki Stadium, and is buoyed by the return of Salomon Kalou, who trained with his team-mates on the artificial surface on a chilly Moscow Monday.
This doesn't sound like a serious injury, and if Lampard can return for the Wolves match it won't be a serious loss for Chelsea. However, should neither player recover in time it might be a boost for fantasy managers. Next in line would be Yuri Zhirkov, who in the Yahoo! game is listed as a bargain basement defender.
For me, this is especially interesting as my current cheap defender is Jerome Boateng who limped out of the match as City limped past Blackpool. We'll have to see how severe the injury was - or it might have been whiplash from tracking Blackpool's runners all match - but either way his place looks to be in doubt with Richards returning and replacing him.
Boateng is number one right back, Mancini:
ReplyDelete"This system, he said, would change shortly. "It's out of necessity. [Emmanual] Adebayor has just recovered from injury, [Mario] Balotelli not so. Without flying full backs like [Jérôme] Boateng and [Aleksandar] Kolarov, who can push forward, I've had to adjust the team to get results and stay in touch with the leaders. But only until everyone is back and fit.""
http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2010/oct/06/carlos-tevez-roberto-mancini-man-city