Graham Potter explains Thiago Silva Chelsea absence vs Wolves

Graham Potter has revealed that managing his squad’s playing time in tandem with players carrying issues has led to his seven Chelsea changes as the Blues face Wolves.

Inaddition to Wesley Fofana, who is absent due to a knee strain, Thiago Silva is absent from the Blues’ squad while Mateo Kovacic, Reece James, Ben Chilwell, Raheem Sterling and Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang have all dropped to the bench.

Chelsea earned their third win in a row under Potter, and the former Brighton boss still believes that his side were good enough to defeat a Wolves team who start with Diego Costa up front.

Potter said ahead of the game: “A bit of the schedule, individuals carrying certain things, recovery times and lots of other factors. But most importantly, we have tried to select a team that can win the match.

“I want to see a similar personality to the other night. I thought that was good. We need to attack and defend in a good and balanced way. We’re playing against a team with a lot of attacking players so it will be an interesting game.”

Following the match, Potter went into greater detail about his players’ situations:

“Thiago has had a heavy cold but played against Milan. With two days to recover, that was short so we didn’t want to take the chance.

“Three games for Ben Chilwell wouldn’t have been the smartest thing to do. Reece had a dead leg yesterday but we wanted to give him a little bit more time.

“We were also missing Wesley. Raheem’s load was massive so we thought it would be good for him to have a breather, and it was a similar thing with Auba.”