The Blues head to Villa Park on Saturday in sixth position, just one point below Manchester City in fourth and level on points with fifth-place Bournemouth.

In his pre-match press conference on Friday morning, Maresca confirmed Chelsea will once again be without Benoit Badiashile, Wesley Fofana, Romeo Lavia, Marc Guiu and Nicolas Jackson due to the respective injuries which have ruled them out of our recent matches.

And the Italian confirmed Madueke will also miss the trip to Birmingham after being forced off against Brighton following 21 minutes.

‘We don't have any update on the injuries,’ Maresca said. ‘We don't have any additional injuries, which is good.

‘Noni will probably be out until the international break. We can have most of the players back after the international break, maybe all of them, and it can be a big boost for us.’

Standing in the way of three points this weekend is an Aston Villa side led by Unai Emery – a man Maresca has a lot of respect for given his work since becoming a head coach.

With Villa competing across both domestic and European fronts like the Blues, Maresca is expecting a difficult challenge against a strong side with many threats. Axel Disasi – on loan at Villa from Chelsea – is one player who won’t face us this weekend, however.

‘Aston Villa are a very good team,’ added Enzo.

‘Since the new project with Emery, they are doing fantastic. This season you can see in the Champions League they finished in the top eight to qualify for the knockout phase, which is an unbelievable achievement for the club, plus they are fighting to finish in the top four of the Premier League.

‘The team are very good, they know clearly how they want to play - both on the ball and off the ball - and the manager is probably one of the best managers [in the league].’