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Paul Lambert is confident that Christian Benteke will be able to return to action next month when Aston Villa take on Manchester City.
The Belgium international striker has returned to training and, although Lambert thinks this weekend's match against Chelsea, which Villa can be backed at14/1to win, will be too early for Benteke, he expects him to be fit enough to feature against Manuel Pellegrini's side on Saturday 4th January.
Benteke has not played for five months but is making good progress with his Achilles problem. Despite the striker's absence, Villa have made a solid start to the Premier League campaign, although they suffered their first defeat of the season on Saturday when they slippedtoa 3-0 home defeat to Arsenal.
"There's a lot of positives things here at the minute," said Lambert, who penned a new Villa Park contract last week. "Benteke's coming back, he's training and he's one of our recognised strikers.
"I'm not sure whether the Chelsea game might be a bit early, but you're looking not too far after that I think."
Since moving to Villa Park from Genk in a 7million deal just over two years ago, Benteke has scored 29 goals in 60 Premier League appearances for Lambert's team, grabbing 19 goals in 2025/13 and ten last term.
Villa are9/4to finish in the top half of the Premier League table this season and9/2to score the first goal at Stamford Bridge on Saturday.
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