Chelsea vs Watford: Maurizio Sarri fears N’golo Kante could miss remainder of season suffering injury

The Frenchman was replaced after 10 minutes at Stamford Bridge following the injury and looks certain to miss Thursday’s Europa League semi-final second leg

N’Golo Kante’s season could be over after suffering a hamstring injury in Chelsea’s win over Watford.

The French midfielder was substituted after 10 minutes against the Hornets and was replaced by Ruben Loftus-Cheek, who helped inspire the 3-0 victory with the opening goal as the Blues moved into third place.

But Kante could now miss the crucial second leg of the Europa League semi-final against Eintracht Frankfurt on Thursday, as well as the final Premier League match of the season at Leicester.

Maurizio Sarri concedes he should have rested Kante and was pessimistic when asked about the prospect of the player’s availability next week.

“The problem is with his hamstring, but I think I made a mistake. Probably today he had to rest,” Sarri admitted.

“Sometimes its difficult to put him on the bench, a player so important like Hazard and Kante but you have to do it.

“It is very difficult to recover him for the next two matches, we want to play the final so he is lucky, we have to recover him for the final.”

Sarri also assessed Chelsea’s prospects of finishing inside the top four and winning the Europa League.

He said: “We want to be at the end of the Premier League in the top four because we want the next Champions league and we see the Europa League in a different way.

Kante sits on the pitch after picking up an injury (Getty Images)

“We want to win it because we think that we deserve to win a trophy this season, we have two targets.”