Jose Mourinho has four first-team players unavailable as Manchester United prepare to take on Leicester City at the King Power Stadium on Saturday.
Manchester United and Leicester City will bring the curtains down on the first half of the Premier League season, when they face each other at King Power on Saturday. As his side looks to return to winning ways after a disappointing loss to Bristol City in the Carabao Cup, Jose Mourinho has a few concerns on his hands.
Antonio Valencia (hamstring), Eric Bailly (ankle), Michael Carrick (calf) and Marouane Fellaini (knee) are the four first-team players who have not made the travelling squad due to their respective injuries.
The injuries to Valencia and Bailly, in particular, are concerning, with very little cover at right-back beyond the former. In Bailly’s absence, Chris Smalling and Marcos Rojo are likely to continue at the heart of the Manchester United defence, having been rested in the midweek cup tie.
The manager also revealed that Michael Carrick is unlikely to feature during the festive period. #MUFC pic.twitter.com/ryOs3zVmBJ
— Manchester United (@ManUtd) December 22, 2017
When asked about the updates on the injured players during his pre-match press conference, Mourinho was quite brief, providing no timescale for the return of Carrick, Fellaini and Valencia. Bailly will be out for up to three months, as briefed last weekend.
“Valencia is out as you know. Eric Bailly is having surgery right now or just finished. Who else [is injured]? Nobody else. Everything is okay. No timescales but not for the Christmas period [for the returns of Fellaini and Carrick].
The Manchester United boss also confirmed that he will ring in the changes on Saturday, as he did for the midweek game, with his travelling squad to Bristol only returning to Manchester in the early hours of Thursday.
“Of course, for the game at Bristol City, we changed a lot of the players, so we managed to give a rest to many of them and especially to the lucky ones that did not travel. Because the ones that did travel, even some who did not play, arrived back in Manchester close to 5am. People like Mata or Smalling, who were on the bench, had to travel back.”
Leicester manager Claude Puel, on the other hand, is without just Robert Huth (foot) and Matty James (Achilles), although the duo have returned to training. Wilfred Ndidi is in contention to start though, having served his one-match ban in the Foxes’ midweek loss to Manchester City.
