Sean Dyche is optimistic that Jarrad Branthwaite will recover from his injury for Everton’s Premier League game at home against Nottingham Forest on Sunday.
Branthwaite was taken off early in the second half of Everton’s 6-0 loss to Chelsea on Monday evening.
But Dyche has confirmed that the 21-year-old has started light training before Forest’s visit to Goodison Park on Sunday afternoon.
When asked about injuries to Branthwaite and Dominic Calvert-Lewin, Dyche said on Friday: ‘Both trained, we were light today but both trained light and came through it, so we hope there is no reaction to that.
‘Patto will be out for the season, he will need surgery. Very unfortunate injury. We’re disappointed on that one for him as much as us.
‘Seamus, we’re waiting on but hopefully it will calm down quickly but touch-and-go, at best, for this weekend.
‘He [Idrissa Gueye] should be okay. His calf settled and he trained today, similar, low-level training today but he trained and he was okay.’
Asked for more information about Branthwaite’s condition, Dyche added: ‘Yeah, as I said, he’s come through today but it was a light session.
‘There will be a bit more on it tomorrow so hopefully there’s no reaction today and therefore he can move forward tomorrow.’
Dyche also asserts his Everton players have used the last few days to ‘make sense’ of their 6-0 defeat to Chelsea at the start of the week.
‘We can’t just park it, that’s for sure. I certainly haven’t,’ said Dyche.
‘The players were affected by it, very disappointed, as was I and my part, of course, as a manager.
‘I take responsibility inevitably. We spoke to the players about it, they’ve fed back their disappointment as well as mine.
‘But equally, by now we’ve made sense of it, of course, the day after we certainly didn’t, it was a challenge. But now you do have to park it, we had a chat about it this morning to finish it off, go, ‘right, that’s gone, we move forwards’.
‘You’ve got to do the basics, you’ve got to work, you’ve got to harry, you’ve got to press, you’ve got to fight, you’ve got to tackle, you’ve got to play, of course, we were nowhere near either.’
