Chelsea Team News: Hiddink Confirms Huge Injury Blow + Attacking Duo Ruled Out

Chelsea will look to continue their recent good form when they take on Southampton at St Marys Stadium on Saturday afternoon.

Ahead of the game, Guus Hiddink has been speaking to the media at his pre-match press conference today and he’s given Chelseafc.com a team news and injury update.

Unfortunately, the interim Blues boss confirmed a huge blow with the news that John Terry will not be ready to make his comeback from a hamstring injury that’s kept him out for the last two weeks.

The Chelsea skipper is currently doing light work in the gym and on the training pitch but Hiddink says he won’t rush the centre-back too soon so he won’t make the trip to the south coast tomorrow.

There was also a brief update on Radamel Falcao with the Chelsea boss confirming that the Colombian international remains injured with an ongoing thigh injury while Alexandre Pato has also been ruled out of the Southampton game as he continues to work on his fitness following his loan move last month.

Hiddink told the clubs website:

‘He will not be fit. He is still in treatment, every now and then he goes in the gym. He is doing exercises there and on the pitch but he is not fit.

‘We want to be careful with this kind of injury. When you have something in the tendon or in the hamstring then sometimes you think, as a player or manager, that it appears to be good, but you must be careful.

‘I am in favour of waiting two or three days more because it’s not good to have a setback. We have Norwich on Tuesday and we will see whether he will be available and fit.’

“Falcao is also still injured. Pato is not yet quite ready to play.”

With Terry still sidelined and Kurt Zouma out for the season with a knee injury, Branislav Ivanovic is expected to continue alongside Gary Cahill at centre-back tomorrow with Cesar Azpilicueta and Baba Rahman filling the full-back slots.

Chelsea head to the south coast having lost just once in their last 13 games and that was a 2-1 defeat at PSG in the Champions League last week, so Hiddink will be hoping to build on their form with another positive result this weekend.