Crystal Palace boss Patrick Vieira provides fresh injury update with key defender missing for Fulham

Crystal Palace manager Patrick Vieira has confirmed his team is almost at full strength going into the game against Fulham on Boxing Day.

Palace lost their last Premier League before the break to Nottingham Forest while Fulham also drew 1-1 to West Ham United.

Fulham are in a better place due to a strong start but Palace have lost only twice at Selhurst this season, one to Arsenal and the other to Chelsea.

The Eagles will be without their key defender though - Marc Guehi - who has picked up five yellow cards and will now sit out this one.

That will open the door for the likes of James Tomkins and Joel Ward to come into the team and try to keep the in-form Aleksandar Mitrović who has nine goals in the Premier League.

The Eagles will move to the top half of the Premier League table if they can take all three points.

They had a really mixed winter preseason failing to win a game on their trip to Turkey and they could not win against Trabzonspor and Napoli but they would be delighted with the fact that they got the win against Real Valladolid to seal their effort ahead of Fulham.

Vieira admitted the exercise in Turkey was good and he goes into the game against Fulham with just the two who were missing before the break still out.

He told the press: “The injury situation, we still have James McArthur who is working on his individual and Nathan Fergusonis getting close.”

The Palace boss also admitted losing Guehi is a big blow but was counting on the other players to step up.

On the January transfer and the contract issue of Wilfried Zaha Vieira confirmed he the club wanted the talisman to stay even though the focus is on him training and helping the team at the moment.

He added: “Wilfred knows the position of the football club and the decision is going to be his but everyone knows we want him to be with us. The only focus now is how he is training and he is focused on the team.”