Chelsea are back in action this Saturday and take on fellow Premier League fighters Liverpool. That sentence alone feels so weird to write!
The club’s struggles are shown in their league positions, with Liverpool and Chelsea currently on 28 points in ninth and tenth, with the aforementioned only ahead on goal difference. A real sign of how stagnant both clubs and managers have been of late. Imagine to think that Liverpool and Chelsea would be in a mid-table battle in January, at the start of this season!
Liverpool’s slump this season has really surprised me, but I’m certainly not going to be fooled by that. They’ll be back, I’m sure. As will Chelsea.
Liverpool have a 52% chance of winning and Chelsea only 24%. Despite the form of both clubs, I still see the home team as the favorite here. Chelsea, as underdogs, can often be a good thing these days, so I’m happy with that.
Liverpool have lost to Brighton and Brentford in their last two league games, conceding six goals. There is an absolute chance that we will hurt them on Saturday, but they have a chance to hurt us as well, as they have a much better goal-scoring ratio than we have this season.
Graham Potter will have some big decisions to make, the first of which will be training. This is a prediction that he could choose:
I think it will be mostly the same team from the win at Crystal Palace, and many of them don’t deserve to be eliminated. One wild card I’m thinking of though is David Fofana. I know he was ignored last game, but Kai Havertz missed practice yesterday and we know how underdog (poor) Pierre Emerick Aubameyang is, so maybe Potter will throw Fofana. I also think we will see a debut for Mykhailo Mudryk, building on what Potter did with Joao Felix.
Unfortunately, I don’t think we’ll have Reece James or Ben Chilwell around for a little longer either.
Let’s hope Chelsea can capitalize on the rumors about a win last weekend, as well as adding exciting player Mudryk to the squad!
