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Although The Blues didn’t completely torpedo their hopes of ending up in the highest eight places of the continental tournament opening phase, they executed a targeted blow on their own hopes of automatically qualifying for the knockout stages. Of course, the silver lining is that in the short one-year history of the recently revamped tournament, achieving a place in the top eight isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.

The Core Problem: 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 widely discussed since their loss in Bergamo. Since seemingly confirming their quality with an impressive beat-down of a European giant, followed by a feisty stalemate with Arsenal, the team have been defeated by Leeds, played out a snoozy stalemate at Bournemouth and have now lost against a mid-table side from Serie A.

Although critics have been eager to point the finger on a selection policy that seems to see Enzo Maresca change his lineup like a kebab shop’s elephant leg of doner meat, the Chelsea head coach maintains that, injuries and suspensions aside, the core of his first eleven for games against strong opposition is mostly fixed.

“In my view in that game, first XI, we had inside the pitch the majority of the team that featured against Spurs, they play against Barcelona, they play against Wolves, Arsenal,” he stated. “There were eight, nine players that are the ones consistently selected for matches of this magnitude. So if you look at the five changes that we did compared to Bournemouth game, it’s a different situation.”

The Path Forward

For a genuine opportunity of avoiding the additional knockout round, Chelsea will have to be victorious in their remaining two matches. First up, they host the unexpected contenders Pafos, then travel back to Italy to face the Italian title holders, Napoli.

“Victories in both are required, if not, we try to play the extra round and then go to the next round,” sniffed Maresca, whose following fixture is a match against an Everton team whose current form has taken to them to the surprising position of seventh in the Premier League.

Side Stories

Notable Comment: “You know, it’s somewhat ironic because his greatest wish was me turning pro in golf. That was his ultimate ambition. So when I was 10, he pushed me to start on golf. So I played golf 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 Premier League.

Readers' Letters

“Well, no wonder Wolverhampton Wanderers are in such a poor situation. As any longtime reader of this column will know, the only effective pre-match protests involve walking from a public house that the supporters planned to be at anyway, to the ground that they were always going to. Just showing up 10 minutes late? That’s how long it takes fans to get to their seats anyway” – a correspondent.

“I see that a reader not only got Tuesday’s featured letter, but also a name check in a separate 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 frequency of appearances in your letters section is inversely related to the value of anything our teams are achieving on the field?” – another fan.