Football
Mark Rodden 8y

PSG's David Luiz 'in good spirits' after knee injury - Laurent Blanc

Paris Saint-Germain manager Laurent Blanc is confident that the latest knee injury centre-back David Luiz has picked up will not prove too serious.

Luiz, 28, limped off in the final seconds of PSG's 2-0 victory over Toulouse in their Coupe de la Ligue semifinal match at the Parc des Princes on Wednesday.

The Brazil international appeared to twist his right knee, leading to fears that he could miss the Champions League round-of-16 meeting with his former club Chelsea in Paris on Feb. 16.

Speaking after the game, however, Blanc did not appear overly concerned.

"I just saw him and of course he had ice on his knee," the PSG boss said at a postmatch news conference. "But he was in good spirits so that's already a good thing.

"I don't want to get ahead of myself but he was able to put his foot on the ground and his knee didn't swell up straightaway.

"We'll have to wait until tomorrow [Thursday] to really know the nature of the injury."

PSG already have concerns in defence as captain Thiago Silva has been resting up with a knee ligament problem and a third Brazilian, Marquinhos, sat out the Toulouse match with an adductor strain.

But Blanc, 50, is hopeful that Luiz suffered nothing more than a scare.

"In any case, he was laughing [in the dressing room]," the former France head coach said. "I think that maybe he got a fright.

"I hope so anyway because as you know he's an important element of the team and especially at the moment because in this area we have a lot of injured players who will come back soon.

"David was very important these past few matches so I'd like to congratulate him because he played practically all of them.

"He carried out his role perfectly so maybe we'll give him a bit of rest.

"But I hope he'll still be fit to play because he's an important guy for the squad."

Luiz has already missed a month of action with a knee injury this season after injuring himself while on international duty with Brazil in October.

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