Sean Dyche has warned his Burnley side not to read too much into Wilfried Zaha’s anticipated absence, insisting they still face a tough test against Crystal Palace tomorrow. Palace have only two wins from 19 games without their talisman, the most recent being away to Leeds United on Monday night. Zaha is not expected to be fit in time to face the Clarets at Selhurst Park tomorrow as he nurses a hamstring injury. But Dyche said Burnley must not be lulled into a false sense of security.
Sean Dyche said “Stats suggest that that’s the case, I’m not saying it’s that easy. Our intent and purpose is to go and perform to win obviously, but we don’t take it for granted if Zaha’s not available. They’ve got very good players there, a very good manager, so we’ve certainly got to be delivering the right performance to get a win down there. (They are) not very close unfortunately. Players of the quality of James Tomkins, James McArthur and Wilf Zaha, they are players that we miss. There are an awful lot of players from our first team missing, we were very limited on the bench. But to be frank that didn’t stop us choosing what I thought was a very competitive team, we just played worse than Leeds. Corky and Popey recovered to train today, that’s good news. Charlie Taylor is getting fitter but will be touch and go, Robbie Brady is similar but different to Charlie. It’s the risk and reward of playing these guys. Woody is a doubt for the weekend but Josh Brownhill has settled down. It was a soft tissue injury so we’re pleased with that but it’s been a bit longer than we thought but it’s settling down now so he’d certainly be in with a chance I would say.”
Midfielder Josh Brownhill is in contention after being sidelined for two weeks with a foot injury sustained against Aston Villa – missing four games. But the 25-year-old has returned to first team training to give manager Dyche a squad boost, along with midfielder Jack Cork and goalkeeper Nick Pope, who both missed Tuesday’s FA Cup defeat at home to AFC Bournemouth.But Zaha’s absence is not the only injury concern for Palace boss Roy Hodgson, who only named six substitutes at Elland Road in midweek, with Jeffrey Schlupp, James Tomkins, James McArthur, James McCarthy and Joel Ward all missing, and not expected to be available this weekend.
