Graham Potter explains Reece James and Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang absences after making seven changes for Wolves win

Potter’s changes paid off at home to Wolves on Saturday (Picture: Getty)

Graham Potter has explained Reece James missed Chelsea’s victory over Wolves due to a ‘dead leg’ with Pierre-Emerick Aubamayang and Raheem Sterling handed ‘breathers’.

Potter made seven changes to his side that beat Crystal Palace at Selhurst Park last weekend with the Blues demonstrating their strength in depth with a solid 3-0 win.

It was Potter’s first home victory in the league as Chelsea boss, following on from a 3-0 win over AC Milan in the Champions League on Wednesday.

A trip to San Siro now looms large on Tuesday with Potter taking the opportunity to rotate his squad ahead of that clash.

Thiago Silva was left out completely, while Aubameyang, Sterling and James all have to make do with a place on the bench with Conor Gallagher, Ruben Loftus-Cheek, Christian Pulisic and Kai Havertz among those coming in.

Explaining some of his changes, Potter told a post-match press conference: ‘Thiago has had a heavy cold but played against Milan. With two days to recover, that was short so we didn’t want to take the chance.

‘Three games for Ben Chilwell wouldn’t have been the smartest thing to do. Reece had a dead leg yesterday but we wanted to give him a little bit more time. We were also missing Wesley.

Chelsea cruised to a win at Stamford Bridge (Picture: Getty)

‘Raheem’s load was massive so we thought it would be good for him to have a breather, and it was a similar thing with Auba.’

Saturday’s win was the first of seven games to be played over the next 24 days for Chelsea with the World Cup now looming large in November.

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‘It’s exciting. It’s been a really strong week. It’s not easy, going Wednesday and Saturday, Potter said.

 ‘Credit to the players. It’s a strong performance, especially in the first half. We had to hang on a bit in the second half but overall we deserved to win.

‘I pick the right team to [try to] win. The schedule is tight so there’s not a load of recovery time.

‘We have to try to select the best team to give us the chance to perform well.’

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