Chelsea face Wolves tonight in what looks like it could be a pivotal game in this second stage of the Blues’ season.
After a relatively forgiving opening third of the campaign, where they took advantage of a soft run of fixtures to work up an impressive unbeaten run, Frank Lampard’s team began a much tougher period – which will see them play Leicester, Man City and Arsenal, plus the in-form Aston Villa and West Ham over the next month – with a loss to Everton on Saturday.
It’s no reason to panic, but the game against Wolves tonight no longer looks as winnable as it did a week ago. Despite being the away team, and despite the bad result last time out, a look at the odds here shows that Frank Lampard’s team are still heavy favourites to win the game.
That reflects Wolves’ poor form too of course. While we’ve been on a strong run they’ve struggled, and losing their star striker Raul Jimenez to a nasty head injury hasn’t helped either.
With him out, Joao Moutinho suspended, and Adama Traore not showing the kind of form he did last season, Nuno’s team are starting to lose the dangerous edge they’ve had ever since winning promotion two years ago. After a brilliant series of successes in the transfer market, it looks like they finally stumbled this summer, with big players sold and not quite replaced.
Despite that, our confidence isn’t sky high for the game.. Our endless run of fixtures looks to be taking a toll, and we’re three wingers down now. The defeat at Everton at the weekend saw a slew of crosses from left and right, with Reece James and Ben Chilwell getting forwards into dangerous areas but not finding the head of Olivier Giroud when it mattered.
Lampard will have a big decision to make tonight over whether to play the France forward again, or to give Tammy Abraham a run out. The equivalent fixture last term came early in the season and proved to be a real watershed for Frank Lampard’s team as they scored 5. Abraham bagged a hattrick, and it proved to be a launchpad for him for the rest of the season.
Let’s hope tonight’s game can provide a similar staging post for this whole team to dust themselves down after their first loss in a while and get stuck into this tougher run with enthusiasm.
