Chelsea’s struggles in the last two years have been in such a large part down to the injuries to Reece James and Ben Chilwell that many fans have become obsessive in monitoring the minutes each gets.
The pair had really bad injuries last season, and followed that up with medium bad injuries in this campaign. They’ve both worked their way back to fitness now, and both joined up with England for this international break.
We’re praying they don’t get hurt or even used too much, so last night’s game was ideal. James came on as a second half sub (along with Chelsea teammate Conor Gallagher), and Chilwell didn’t feature at all.
England’s next game is against Ukraine on Sunday, and while both are likely to accumulate further minutes in that game, it shouldn’t be too strenuous and shouldn’t affect their availability for Chelsea’s game against Aston Villa next weekend.
Fingers crossed, anyway!
