Chelsea have missed Pulisic - Lampard

Frank Lampard admits Chelsea have missed Christian Pulisic in recent weeks and is still unsure when the U.S. national team star will return from a thigh injury.

Pulisic had established himself as a key figure for Chelsea after starting the season on the bench, but the attacker has been sidelined since playing in the 1-1 draw at Brighton on New Year’s Day.

He did not travel for Chelsea’s 2-2 draw at Leicester on Saturday and Lampard is hoping the upcoming winter break will help the process of getting Pulisic back on to the pitch.

"It is hard to answer [on when he will be back]," Lampard told reporters at the King Power Stadium. "We tried to get him out this week and step it up a little bit but we had to pull out of that. So the break might have come at a good time because it buys us a couple of weeks.

"I won't have an answer till we're back training. Yes, [we miss him] because he's a quality player and was having a really good patch pre-Christmas. But others have to stand up too. But, of course, we'll be happy to have him back."

In the absence of Pulisic, Reece James has arguably become Chelsea’s most creative player with the teenage right-back earning praise for his crossing ability.

The 19-year-old was unlucky not to register an assist with a host of dangerous balls against Brendan Rodgers' side and Lampard is excited to see his homegrown star develop in the coming months.

"Yes, he was good," Lampard added. "That's not new, that's been his recent form. He had a small injury and missed the game against Arsenal and Hull. But he's a weapon for us. He can attack with his crossing but we need to get on the end of them more.

"And he's also very solid defensively. When you think of his age, you can get excited about Reece. There is a lot more he can obviously do but I'm really pleased with how he's developing at the minute.


"There are all the sides of his game he can work on, although I'm not going to improve his crossing, I don't think, because he's a natural. But we can talk about his position, his link-up with the winger in front of him and the midfield players, and his defensive attributes because they are first and foremost.

"And making sure he is always in the right areas. And he is very open to that, as he should be. Like all the young players at Chelsea are, they are sponges, they want to learn. They want to listen. So you enjoy coaching them because they want to get better."

Chelsea now have just over two weeks to get ready to face Manchester United with the Premier League introducing a winter break this season ahead of Euro 2020 in the summer.

There has been a mixed response to the introduction of the break, with Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp annoyed that his side have an FA Cup replay when others are away, however, Lampard is a fan and explained how he will use the fortnight.

"I will take a few days off," he concluded. "I'm not travelling anywhere far afield but it will be nice to spend some family time. This job is consuming and I've probably given my wife too much chat about football when we've been having dinner and stuff.

"Sometimes I get told that so I'll try to refrain for a few days and then get back to work. I know it has been talked about a lot, particularly because of the Klopp situation, but there are lot of people in a football club who work intensely and the players do a lot of travelling and so on, so I think we're all for it.

"We championed it when we didn't have it because it didn't help our European team and maybe our national team, and then we moan about it when we have got it and try to find a reason why we shouldn't have it. I think it is a good thing."