Moises Caicedo was the notable star missing from Mauricio Pochettino’s team today to face Newcastle.
The midfielder played two 90 minutes games with Ecuador over the international break, and only made it back to Stamford Bridge yesterday. He was never going to play today, once we heard that news from the coach in his press conference yesterday.
Pochettino had the following to say about the absence of the box to box powerhouse:
“Yes, it is true that with Moises Caicedo we need to manage his minutes carefully.
“He only arrived back with us yesterday from international duty with Ecuador and has only had one training session, so we felt it was best that we avoid any possible [injury] problems and just be careful with him with so many games ahead.
“This is why we have a big squad, so we can use the players. We do not want to force players to play when they are maybe not in complete perfect condition, so Moises not starting is just to avoid any risk.”
He’s on the bench, but really if we’ve been told it’s not a great idea medically to play him, we should do everything we can to avoid it. There are other options there who can make a difference.
The issue of having our two first choice midfielders playing regularly for their international sides in South America is just something the squad is going to have to be built to account for.
