Breaking: Chelsea lose key first team player until the end of the season according to latest Maresca update | OneFootball

Enzo Maresca has just taken his press conference ahead of our game against Crystal Palace tomorrow, and there was some devastating bad news right off the bat.

After three bad results in a row we were looking for a boost in confidence – instead we got a terrible update on Wesley Fofana. The central defender picked up a hamstring problem against Aston Villa at the start of December, and it doesn’t look like he’ll be seeing him again anytime soon:

“Unfortunately, he could be out for the entire season. We don’t know exactly yet, but it’s a huge loss,” the coach said when asked about the progress of the central defender, who would be expected back pretty soon if the initial 5 week prognosis had held.

“It is a hamstring injury and unfortunately we are going to lose him for a while.”

Asked why that initial prediction had been blown away, Maresca explained further:

“The initial feeling was for 5 weeks but then more tests gave us bad news. We don’t know exactly yet [how long it will be], but it’s a huge loss.”

Losses stack up in defence for Chelsea as busy Christmas bites

Benoit Badiashile battles Dejan Kulusevski for the ball. (Photo by Shaun Botterill/Getty Images)

The loss of Fofana was compounded soon after by Benoit Badiashile, who picked up a training issue a couple of weeks later and has yet to return.

A glum Maresca gave an update on him too: “Benoit will be out at least until February.”

That leaves Levi Colwill and Tosin Adarabioyo as our first choice central defensive pair, with the return of Aaron Anselmino from loan making a lot more sense now that we have this Fofana update.

Just when we needed our best and most experienced players on hand to turn results around, we have been hit with a body blow.