Roberto De Zerbi confirms major Moises Caicedo Brighton decision amid Chelsea transfer pursuit
Roberto De Zerbi has confirmed that Moises Caicedo will not feature for Brighton against Chelsea on Saturday evening. The two English clubs are set to do battle in the Premier League summer series in Philadelphia, but both look set to be without some key players.
Mauricio Pochettino named an inexperienced starting XI for the pre-season friendly against Wrexham and he has hinted he will go for the same approach despite Reece James, Enzo Fernandez and Mykhailo Mudryk all being in training for the last few days.
«No, we’re going to mix also,» Pochettino said when asked if he needs to get closer to his favoured starting XI in the next set of friendlies. «Still we have players who need time to train, several like Enzo only arrived on Monday. After a long period of holidays. We play Brighton on Saturday. It's not because we're going to play a Premier League team I need to play with senior players.
»We need to care about the players, we need to provide the best tools for him to arrive in the best condition when we start the Premier League. I am going to continue the young players the possibility to play on Saturday and the next few games."
Impressive cameos in the week from Carney Chukwuemeka, Angelo Gabriel, Andrey Santos and Cesare Casadei could see them rewarded with more minutes against Brighton while some senior players reach the fitness levels currently held by the majority of the squad.
De Zerbi has also had to welcome some late arrivals to his pre-season camp with Caicedo being the obvious one. According to The Athletic's Andy Naylor, the 44-year-old has confirmed that Caicedo will not play against Chelsea having only been training with the team for the last two days.
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