Chelsea’s Reece James set to return against high-flying Liverpool

Enzo Maresca has said Chelsea captain Reece James has recovered from injury and is available to make his first appearance of the season against Liverpool on Sunday.

James has suffered with frequent muscular injuries over the past few seasons and has not featured in a competitive game for the club since the penultimate match of the 2023-24 campaign when he was sent off during a 2-1 win over Brighton.

Asked about James’ fitness after he returned to full training on Monday, Maresca said: “He’s available, yeah, finally he’s back. He worked with us all the international break and it’s good news especially for him because the injury is not a good feeling. So finally he’s back.”

James played just 482 minutes of first-team football last season as hamstring injuries kept him on the sidelines. The right-back underwent surgery in an attempt to correct the issues in December 2023, before he picked up another hamstring injury during the club’s preseason tour of the United States this summer.

Maresca said that he plans to ease James back into the first-team picture slowly by initially limiting his match time as the player’s body cannot cope with two matches in a week.

“It’s complicated when you get injury, injury, injury again it’s not easy so you are always looking for a solution,” Maresca told a news conference on Friday.

“Probably the solution with Reece is the same solution we are using with Romeo [Lavia] and Wes [Wesley Fofana] in terms of using them just once a week, one game. Because probably in this moment, for different reasons, Reece’s body cannot play for instance twice a week.”

Chelsea will travel to Anfield with confidence following their encouraging start to the season — they are fourth in the table and are looking to maintain their unbeaten record away from home.

Maresca was named the Premier League’s manager of the month for September, while Cole Palmer picked up the player of the month award after he scored five goals and provided one assist in four matches.

Chelsea will be without defenders Marc Cucurella and Fofana for the trip to Anfield after they both picked up their fifth yellow cards of the season in the 1-1 draw against Nottingham Forest before the international break