Chelsea manager confirmed winger Noni Madueke missed the 5-0 win over Morecambe due to illness.

The Italian coach left the England international back in December due to a “technical decision” against Fulham.

But he explained that there had been no such controversy after Saturday’s comfortable victory: “That was only because he had not finished the session yesterday. He wasn’t feeling well,” he explained.

Reece James and Romeo Lavia both returned from hamstring injuries but only managed 45 minutes against the League Two minnows.

Maresca explained that the half-time change was planned in advance, adding: “The idea is to slowly build the right constitution.”

“Especially with Reece we have to be a little more careful. The good thing is that they both played 45 minutes and performed well without any problems. We can start to help them and create the right constitution.”

“Hopefully now we can start to help them build the right conditioning.”

Chelsea last won the FA Cup in 2018 but have lost three finals between 2020 and 2022.

Maresca was asked about the importance of this competition – as he aims to win silver medals in his first season at Stamford Bridge.

“It is an important competition, but since we started we have tried to treat all competitions equally,” he added.

“The Premier League, the Conference League, unfortunately we lost to Newcastle in the Carabao Cup, now in the FA Cup. We try to do our best in all competitions.”