Micky van de Ven to be out until after the international break
One of the very few negatives from the midweek win over Manchester City in the Carabao Cup fourth round, is that Micky van de Ven was forced off with a hamstring injury, with only a little over ten minutes on the clock when he was forced off.
Fans were of course very concerned, and would have been remembering the injury against Chelsea last year. The lack of defensive cover was brought up on a number of occasions in the aftermath, with frustration that van de Ven had been injured *and* Destiny Udogie was unable to get much rest at all.
Ange has today confirmed that van de Ven will miss the games against Aston Villa, Galatasaray, and Ipswich Town, though the injury is not serious, and he should be back after the November international break – quashing any concerns he could be out for as long as he was last season.
This comes as a big opportunity for Radu Dragusin. There have been whispers around his future recently, with Napoli reported to be interested. We all know how gobby his agent can be – well, his client now has a really big opportunity to show why he deserves to play on a more regular basis.
With the lack of otherwise central defensive options, which has of course been particularly documented this week – means there is little other option than to play Dragusin. Even against Galatasary, which is of course in the Europa League, a competition Ange likes to play Ben Davies in, you would still imagine that Dragusin will play.
Especially with the workload currently on Cristian Romero. The defender had to be withdrawn a few minutes into the second half against Manchester City due to fatigue, and Ange will be conscious of this when picking his team for the game in Istanbul on Thursday – and go with a duo of Davies and Dragusin for the game.
That said, we do know what the atmosphere is like for games in Turkey, and Romero’s experience of playing in high level, intense atmospheres, that he will have experienced in South America – might be required. With all due respect to Ipswich, that could actually be the game to give Romero a rest in.
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