🔗 Share this article

Although The Blues avoided a total demolition of their prospects of finishing in the top eight of the Bigger Cup opening phase, they executed a precise, surgical strike on their own chances of waltzing straight into the knockout stages. Naturally, the good news is that in the short one-year history of the new and not-necessarily-improved tournament, securing a place in the top eight isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.

The Central Issue: A Monotonous Inconsistency

Unfortunately for Stamford Bridge regulars, the only consistent thing about the Chelsea team is a monotonously predictable lack of consistency, which has been much remarked upon following their loss in Bergamo. Since seemingly confirming their quality with an commanding victory of a European giant, and then a bad-tempered draw with a London rival, the team have been stuffed by Leeds, played out a snoozy stalemate at Bournemouth and have now lost against a average team from Italy's top flight.

While critics have been eager to point the finger on a team selection approach that appears to see Enzo Maresca rotate his team constantly, the Chelsea head coach insists that, injuries and suspensions aside, the core of his first eleven for games against strong opposition is largely set in stone.

“In my view tonight, starting team, we had inside the pitch eight, nine players that play against Spurs, they play against Barcelona, they played against Wolverhampton, the Gunners,” he stated. “There were most of the regulars that are the ones playing every time for these kind of games. So if you see the five changes that we did from the previous game, it’s a different situation.”

The Path Forward

For a genuine opportunity of escaping the additional knockout round, Chelsea will have to be victorious in their final two group games. First up, they host this season’s surprise package a Cypriot team, then travel back to Italy to face the Italian title holders, the Neapolitan side.

“We need to win both, if not, we will face the extra round and then progress to the next round,” remarked Maresca, whose following fixture is a game against an Everton team whose recent consistency has propelled them to the dizzy heights of seventh in the domestic league.

Side Stories

Notable Comment: “It's interesting, it’s actually funny because his biggest dream was me becoming a professional golfer. That was his ultimate ambition. So when I was 10, he pushed me to take up golf. So I practiced every week from when I was 10 to 13” – a star striker revealed how, had his dad got his way, he could have been teeing off rather than scoring goals in the top flight.

Fan Correspondence

“Well, no wonder Wolves are in such a sad state. As any longtime reader of this email will know, the only effective pre-match protests involve marching from a pub that the supporters intended to visit anyway, to the ground that they were inevitably going to. Just arriving 10 minutes late? That’s how long it takes fans to get to their seats anyway” – one reader.

“I see that one correspondent not only got the previous featured letter, but also a name check in another reader's letter. On a night where both clubs from Sheffield again surrendered points after leading, I am led to ponder: could the city be proving that the regularity of appearances in your letters section is inversely related to the value of anything our teams are accomplishing on the field?” – a different supporter.