Benteke injury update

[Richard E]

Good news. Hopefully he won't be involved tonight and Spurs won't know about him being fit until they see the team sheet on Sunday.

Yes as if Jan Vertonghen is deaf, dumb and blind!

Well, he does sure play a mean pinball!

[paul_e]

who's the lucky bastard mascot that is next to him?

Not a mascot - Zakaria Bakkali - supposed to be a bit special, in the full squad at 17.

I knew it was a player Paul I think Benteke was in another picture with him recently, on Twitter maybe. I was just being an idiot

I assumed as much, just wanted to point out specifically who he was.

[Concrete John]

Benteke declared himself fit to play, but Wilmots didn't. He trained with the group on Sunday and Monday so that's a good sign. He'll be fit for this weekend I reckon.

It does sound promising, but persoanlly I'd ere on the aide of caution and have him on the bench.  Give him 30 minutes or so if the result is still in the balance.

[Toronto Villa]

Benteke declared himself fit to play, but Wilmots didn't. He trained with the group on Sunday and Monday so that's a good sign. He'll be fit for this weekend I reckon.

It does sound promising, but persoanlly I'd ere on the aide of caution and have him on the bench.  Give him 30 minutes or so if the result is still in the balance.

the concern might be whether the game would be in the balance if he isn't playing from the start.

[Concrete John]

the concern might be whether the game would be in the balance if he isn't playing from the start.

We've done quite well without him so far, so you have to have some confidence in the other players.

[OCD]

From seeing his desperation to continue in the Norwich game and hearing that he declared himself fit to play for Belgium, it sounds like he will be desperate to start on Sunday. Lambert's quotes today have been about how he would know how he feels and that will dictate what he does. So it's probably a fair assumption that he will start. Let's just hope that he's ready - young players tend to take on too much too soon and only learn to be cautious with experience.

[eastie]

I will be very surprised if benteke is not starting on Sunday.

[SoccerHQ]

Think he needs to start on Sunday.

The Spurs back 4 could feasibly mark Gabby and Weimann out of the game (Kozak should be taken out for now) but Benteke in there is a whole different proposition.

I'd modifiy the tactics a little, tell Weimann to play deeper and drop into the midfield when necessary, not sure where to put Gabby as he won't outpace Kyle Walker that much.

[Drummond]

He should be on the bench, coming on when we're already 3-0 up.

[olaftab]

I can not see us leading by more than a single goal come 60th minute if he is on the bench so to avoid that he should start and than come off on the hour as we should be 3 goals clear!

[Billy Walker]

Interesting piece here from Matt Kendrick where Lambert gives his views on the Spurs link to Benteke:

Paul Lambert has confirmed Tottenham’s summer interest in Christian Benteke for the first time and revealed how the transfer saga unsettled the Villa striker.

Lambert admits tomorrow’s opponents did enquire about signing Benteke in the close season but stopped short of lodging a bid for claret and blues’ talisman.

Benteke handed in a transfer request during Spurs’ unsuccessful pursuit before Lambert persuaded last season’s top scorer to sign a bumper new four-year contract.

Lambert joked that he bolted the doors of Bodymoor Heath and enlisted the help of former heavyweight boxer Mike Tyson to convince Benteke to remain at the club.

The 22-year-old Belgian has carried on this season where he left off last term and had scored five league and cup goals before getting injured a month ago.

Having been excused international duty in the past week, recovering Benteke could make his Villa return against Andre Villas-Boas men at Villa Park tomorrow.

Asked about the events of the summer, Lambert said: “I was on holiday. I was not bothered. I knew what was happening, I was never really bothered because I knew he was never going to go anywhere.

“I didn’t worry about it. I knew myself what was going on, so I was not going to get caught up in something that was never going to transpire.

“Are you talking about when Spurs came in for him?”

Lambert admits the constant rumours must have affected Benteke even though the manager himself was confident of persuading the former Genk goal-getter to stay at Villa.

“Nearly every team alive were meant to be coming in for him,” said Lambert.

“Some teams you don’t bother with. Unless I hear it from someone’s mouth that’s totally different, but you can read speculation all you want.

“It won’t really faze me until I hear it from somebody else. It never really prayed on my mind what was going to happen.

“I think there were a lot things going on and he’s probably getting it from all directions your head starts to go. what’s happening here. He was asked a lot of questions.

“I’m pretty sure it was the speculation that got to him. Speculation whether it’s wrong or right, if people have seen it in black and white in front of them they think ‘Oh, it must be true.”

“But you hear the crowd again, they are brilliant with him.

“I said to him: ‘you keep doing what you’re doing and you’ll be fine.’

“I think it was out of character. He has a good family behind him and he’s not that type of guy at all. He’s a nice, really humble guy and if he keeps working hard we can see where his career ends up.”

Lambert reckons it was a straight-forward process getting Benteke to commit his future to Villa until 2017 as soon as he spent time with the player at the training ground in late July.

“It took me a day - then it was finished,” he added. “How? I bolted the door! I had Mike Tyson in one corner and Benteke in the other!

“He’s a really good guy and I never had a problem. I never said anything that will shock you, I just had a chat with him to try and see where he was.

“With the transfer thing, he’s 22-years-old, which is still really young in football terms, but he was good about it.”

The bit in bold - I couldn't have summed up Spurs better, myself.

[Rigadon]

Spurs trying get Benteke on the cheap as per usual.  Cockernee cocks

[gervilla]

Hopefully he will show them tomorrow what they could have had if they stumped up the £40 million 

[Billy Walker]

Hopefully he will show them tomorrow what they could have had if they stumped up the £40 million 

Forty, fifty, sixty million...there was no chance Benteke was being sold.

[OCD]

Glad Lambert wasn't worried, this place was going nuts. If he could have taken that day to sort things out a little earlier, it would have saved us all a lot of bother (that doesn't mean I begrudge PL his holiday).