Tottenham manager Roberto De Zerbi has confirmed James Maddison is available for selection but warned that Spurs must be careful not to rush players back from injury.
The midfielder has been working his way back to full fitness after recovering from an ACL injury, but suffered a groin strain in the 2-0 win over Chelsea last week.
However, Tottenham remain without Tosin Adarabioyo, Lucas Bergvall and Mykhailo Mudryk, who are all sidelined.
Speaking ahead of Tottenham’s clash with Crystal Palace, De Zerbi delivered a positive update on Maddison’s fitness while confirming three other players remain unavailable.
“James Maddison is available. Tosin is still out, [so are] Bergvall and Mudryk, but everyone else is available.”
Asked whether Maddison could get away with training less than his team-mates, the Italian stressed the importance of hard work and maintaining fitness.
“I believe in working. I come from a city, Brescia [where] we are used to working hard and we believe in working in hard you receive the good back,” he said.
“For James Maddison or any player coming back from injury, [you] have to work more than the other players but he’s already working hard for four, five weeks and consistently.”
Tottenham boss explains injury concerns after Porro and Kulusevski setbacks
De Zerbi also discussed the importance of managing players carefully, particularly after previous injury problems involving Pedro Porro and Dejan Kulusevski.
The Spurs boss suggested that missing a couple of training sessions is not necessarily a concern, provided the club makes sensible decisions about a player’s fitness.
“So it’s not a problem if you miss two days and then we have to analyse if we take risks or not,” he explained.
“Because if we take risks like we did with Pedro Porro and [Dejan] Kulusevski… we are lucky to have a big squad [but] it’s [about] not taking risks for new injuries.”
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