Mauricio Pochettino has said Chelsea’s injury problems have affected the performance of the team this season.
The Blues have been plagued by injuries to key players and have been regularly without ten to 12 players every week.
Chelsea currently find themselves struggling in 11th place in the Premier League but haven’t had a fully fit squad to pick from once this season.
The Blues again spent heavily in the summer but haven’t been able to use Romeo Lavia or Christopher Nkunku on a regular basis whilst Wesley Fofana was ruled out for the season before it even started.
Captain Reece James has been limited to just eight appearances this season and Ben Chilwell missed months with a hamstring injury.
Pochettino feels this has effected the performance of the team and in quotes picked up by the Press Association said: “When you start the season, you put in your head the idea of the potential of the squad.”
“When you think about Nkunku, Reece, Chilwell or Fofana, Lavia, Caicedo, you imagine the players in the best place, with all their potential.”
“The reality, we’ve had 10, 12 players every single week out. That will affect the performance of the team.”
Pochettino will be without seven players for this afternoon’s trip to Brentford and whilst Marc Cucurella and Thiago Silva are off the injury list the 51 year old said it was a “maybe” if they would be in the squad.