Graham Potter explains N’Golo Kante’s decision and gives Wesley Fofana an update | Football

Graham Potter chose to bench the returning N’Golo Knate (Picture: Hayters TV)

Graham Potter allayed fears that Wesley Fofana suffered another injury during the match ChelseaFrustrating 2-2 draw against Everton.

The summer signing Leicester city has already missed much of the season through injury but has begun to establish himself at the heart of Chelsea’s defense in recent weeks.

Fofana made another start on Saturday, but was withdrawn in the closing stages with his side leading 2-1.

Chelsea and Fonfara’s replacement Trevoh Chalobah was unable to finish the game with Ellis Simms earning a valuable point for the Toffees.

Fofana was seen in the tunnel area holding an ice pack to his thigh, but Potter insists the £72.5 million signing was removed as a precaution.

He said: “Wesley]Fofana was fantastic, defended well, drove the game, but he had to get tired with his hamstring.

‘He took responsibility. Many positive points from the performance as a team and individually, but it’s a sour feeling if you don’t get the three points.’

Kante, meanwhile, has yet to perform for Potter, as he has not appeared once since September, but is keen to perform during the run-up.

However, Potter insisted the influential midfielder is not ready to take risks and will be back in the first team.

He said, ‘Kante is sitting there on the couch and he’s ready. It was difficult to come in for his first game, he’s been gone so long, but he’s ready.’

Potter felt Chelsea were undone by “cheap goals” as they succumbed to a late equalizer.

“We are very disappointed because we lost two points at home,” said Potter. “You saw the intention of the team, there were a lot of positives in the performance. But in the end we didn’t defend well enough. Conceiving two goals means that it is not so easy to win the match. That’s the disappointing thing.

Credit Everton, they do what they do best. They use their physicality, they use set pieces, they ask you a question. But most of the game we controlled well, as best you can at this level.

“Ultimately the first goal is really disappointing from a set piece perspective, we talked about that before the game. The second goal we didn’t attack well enough and exposed ourselves to a big space to defend and didn’t do well enough.

“When you look at how much we put into the game and how much we tried to attack, it’s frustrating to be cheap with the goals we conceded.”

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