Frank Lampard doubt Ziyech and Hudson-Odoi availability ahead of West Ham clash.

Chelsea manager Frank Lampard gave an update on his team and doubt the return of former Ajax player Ziyech and Chelsea academy player Hudson-Odoi ahead of weekends clash against West Ham with Hamstring strains, he made this known in a media conference via video from Cobham.

The former Derby manager who have lost two matches in a row after losing to Everton and Wolves respectively in the Premier league will now host West Ham United on Monday night.

He further stated that there is no fresh injury and hope Ziyech and Hudson-Odoi will back before West Ham game.

‘It is their first day back with the group today training at a decent level, so I will have to see how they are the next two or three days to see if they make West Ham, he said. There was no other fresh injury news to give.’

The Blues manager who talked about the importance of his players welfare brings into focus again the issue of extending the acceptable number of substitutes in league games from three to five, a change that was voted down at Friday’s meeting of Premier League shareholders.

‘I don’t want to talk about it as being a blow,’ said Lampard when asked about the matter.

‘It is just that when we talked about it as managers, the overriding factor from the managers whether they were maybe for or against it, because I think there are different factors to this, was that this is a case of player welfare, making sure we are looking after the players and giving them the best opportunity to perform at an optimum level and not putting them at risk as such because of the uncertain times and the schedule.’

Lampard said that the schedule is about to become even tougher, with Chelsea for as they will be playing  on 26 and 28 of December.

‘So I think it [increasing the substitutions] would be really beneficial for player welfare,’ he added.

‘Normally in the modern day, player welfare and employee welfare comes down from the top. I don’t think it quite has this time but the decision is made and we just carry on.’