According to French publication L’Equipe, N’Golo Kante will return to Chelsea on Friday after suffering a hamstring injury whilst away on international duty for France.
The 29-year-old played the entire 90 minutes of Les Blues’ disappointing 1-1 draw against Ukraine on Wednesday, but will now miss the World Cup qualifiers against Kazakhstan and Bosnia and Herzegovina.
L’Equipe report via a statement published by the French Football Federation (FFF) that Kante felt ‘pain’ in the hamstrings on his left leg at the end of the game.
It’s added that medical examinations undergone by the midfielder revealed a ‘small lesion’, leaving Kane to return to West London tomorrow.
Kante only missed four games with a hamstring blow in January of this year, this blow signals the continuation of a worryingly recurring issue for the world-class defensive midfielder.
See More: West Ham have ‘new Kante’ in their academy, says ex-Hammers chief
Kante missed six games with an injury to this area in the 17/18 season, one in September of the 19/20 season, another two in January, six over last summer’s restart and of course the four in January.
That marks a total of 19 games, though Transfermarkt attribute it as 21 in their injury history section for the World Cup winner, as they count two games as an unused substitute after a pair of the setbacks.
Barring the four-game layoff in the first month of the New Year, Kante had battled back from the injury troubles of last season to reestablish himself as key for the Blues. This setback is very annoying.
Hopefully, Kante is not injured seriously at all and will miss little time, even a short break could hurt Chelsea massively as they look to hold on to a top four spot in the run-in to the end of the season.
The Blues have won that berth via a brilliant unbeaten run following the appointment of Thomas Tuchel.
Per the report, France have also announced that Kante will not be replaced by another play, so Didier Deschamps’ squad will be at 25 men for the rest of the break, barring any other withdrawals.
What a blow for Chelsea