Chelsea will not risk Malo Gusto and Pedro Neto in European action on Thursday but the duo are set to return against Aston Villa this weekend.
Gusto and Neto have not travelled with the squad for their Conference League clash with Bundesliga strugglers Heidenheim.
French defender Gusto missed Saturday’s 2-1 victory at Leicester because of illness while Portugal winger Neto was injured during the recent international break.
Chelsea boss Enzo Maresca expects the pair to return against Aston Villa.
“Both have trained with us. We don’t take any risks for (Thursday’s) game, but I think both should be available for Sunday’s game.”
Maresca says he will continue with his policy of resting his front line stars for European games, taking several academy products such as Kiano Dyer, Samuel Rak-Sakyi and Tyrique George to Germany.
“It’s an important competition, a European competition. Since we started we have tried to share minutes with all the players in the squad,” he said.
“In some of the (Conference League) games, we have also used some young players. So we’ll see. In this moment, it’s like this, and hopefully we can continue in this way.”
Chelsea have won all three of their Conference League games after dispatching Gent, Panathinaikos and Noah, scoring 16 goals in the process, but Maresca is wary of complacency.
“I enjoy every game in this competition knowing that every club tries to make it their big game,” Maresca said.
“The issue for us can be that if we are not ready mentally and we underestimate a team, they can hurt us. So we need to be ready.”
