We’ve got the Fantasy Premier League (FPL) team news information in our third press conference summary ahead of Gameweek 19.
Three matches have already been postponed but you can still catch the headline updates from Thursday’s pressers – featuring Brentford, Burnley, Manchester City, Manchester United, Newcastle United and Southampton – via this link here.
Wednesday’s team news information concerning Arsenal, Aston Villa and Brighton and Hove Albion is available here.
For much more detailed information, check out our Predicted Line-ups page (which is being refreshed on Friday evening) and Injuries and Bans feed.
Az and Neale’s video round-up is below, meanwhile:
And for other help and advice, from our weekly Scout Picks to team reveals, head to our complete Gameweek 19 guide below:
TOTTENHAM HOTSPUR
The injury list is looking much better for Antonio Conte, following their Covid scares of recent weeks. He confirms that, apart from the hamstring problems of Cristian Romero and Ryan Sessegnon, there is nothing to report.
“There were no injuries after West Ham. Romero and Sessegnon are still injured and, until now, no bad news. No, we don’t have new cases of COVID. All the players are back in training.” – Antonio Conte
CRYSTAL PALACE
It’s been quiet on the injury front at Selhurst Park recently, with just James McArthur (hamstring) and Nathan Ferguson (match fitness) unavailable. However, Patrick Vieira revealed in Friday’s pre-match presser there have been “a couple of cases” of Covid in recent days, without revealing any names.
“We hope we’re going to be okay [to face Spurs] but when you’re looking at the number of cases around we start to be worried.
“We had a couple of cases in our football club in the last couple of days. We try our best to prevent the situation but it is worrying because the evolution for the next couple of days we don’t know how it will go.
“I’m not worried about the players’ welfare regarding the [frequency of] games during this period because it’s been like that for years and years. I’m worried about their welfare regarding COVID. Players coming back from the COVID situation and asking them to play with not enough training is a lot on them.” – Patrick Vieira
NORWICH
Midfielder Mathias Normann (pelvic) has suffered a setback that rules him out for the “foreseeable future”, while the Boxing Day trip to Arsenal will come too soon for Milot Rashica (groin). Two defenders who won’t feature over the festive period are Grant Hanley (shoulder) and Andrew Omobamidele (back), whilst Ozan Kabak has recovered from a calf problem but may not be risked at such a chaotic time.
“He [Kabak] is back to fitness now, but to ask him to play two games in three days is going to be too much. Andrew Omobamidele will be out for another ten days with the back stress injury.” – Dean Smith
Covid victims Joshua Sargent, Lukas Rupp, Pierre Lees-Melou and Christos Tzolis are among those who could return but Christoph Zimmermann (ankle) remains unavailable.
WEST HAM UNITED AND LEICESTER CITY
David Moyes hasn’t faced the media since Wednesday’s EFL Cup defeat to Spurs, although did at least reveal then that Michail Antonio missed out because he tested positive for Covid. The West Ham boss hasn’t ruled him out of facing Southampton, however:
“The answer is I don’t know. He has no symptoms and I have to say that he is double-vaccinated. For all those things hopefully we might have him back, yes.” – David Moyes
The suspension of Vladimir Coufal is over, as are the injuries of fellow full-backs Ben Johnson (hamstring) and Ryan Fredericks (groin). The situation still isn’t clear on Aaron Cresswell (back) though, who has been on the verge of a return for some time.
Kurt Zouma (hamstring) and Angelo Ogbonna (knee) remain out.
Brendan Rodgers similarly hasn’t held a stand-alone pre-match press conference ahead of Gameweek 19 but we got new embargoed quotes on Friday, in addition to those made earlier about Jamie Vardy (hamstring).
Asked if any of the players missing in midweek would return on Boxing Day, Rodgers said:
“Definitely not Harvey [Barnes]. Wardy [Danny Ward], no. Jonny [Evans], question mark. Timothy [Castagne], yep, but whether he’s available or not, because he’ll just be returning to training, we’ll have to wait and see.” – Brendan Rodgers
2 years, 4 months agoJust checking whether my comments are still going to be under review or that phase is done for now