The Belgian midfielder hasn’t featured for the Blues since our trip to Arsenal due to a muscle injury sustained during the March international break.

However, speaking in his pre-match press conference ahead of Sunday's clash at Craven Cottage, Maresca outlined that Lavia has returned to training and is available for selection.

The Chelsea head coach said: ‘Romeo is back. He is training with us and can be available for Sunday's game. ‘With him, we are going to try the same thing we are trying with Reece (James).

'I would like to play Reece every three days, but we are trying to manage him to help him. We will try to do exactly the same thing with Romeo because, for us, he is an important player.’

Fewer than 72 hours separate the final whistle being blown against Legia and the Blues players walking out at Craven Cottage on Sunday afternoon.

It's why, despite the defeat suffered on Thursday evening, Maresca is pleased to have rested several players ahead of our west London derby.

He said: ‘We rest Enzo (Fernandez), Moi (Caicedo), Levi (Colwill), Noni (Madueke, Pedro (Neto), we rest many players.

'We are, for sure, not happy about the Conference League result, but at the same time, we try to manage a little bit and rotate players.'