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Although The London club didn’t completely torpedo their hopes of ending up in the top eight of the Bigger Cup group stage, they performed a precise, surgical strike on their own chances of waltzing straight into the knockout stages. Naturally, the silver lining is that in the short one-year history of the recently revamped competition, securing a top-eight finish may not be as crucial as it seems.

The Core Issue: A Predictable Inconsistency

Unfortunately for Stamford Bridge regulars, the sole predictable element about the Chelsea team is a monotonously predictable lack of consistency, which has been widely discussed following their loss in Italy. After seemingly confirming their credentials with an impressive beat-down of a European giant, followed by a feisty stalemate with Arsenal, the team have been stuffed by Leeds, played out a dull draw at the south coast club and have now been beaten by a mid-table side from Serie A.

While pundits 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, knack and naughty step permitting, the nucleus of his starting lineup for games against strong opposition is mostly fixed.

“I think in that game, first XI, we had inside the pitch the majority of the team that featured against Tottenham, they play against Barca, they played against Wolves, the Gunners,” he droned. “There were most of the regulars that are the ones consistently selected for these kind of games. So if you see the five changes that we did from the previous game, it’s different.”

The Path Forward

For a genuine opportunity of avoiding the additional knockout round, Chelsea will have to win their remaining two matches. In the first, they host this season’s surprise package Pafos, before heading back to Italy to face the Italian title holders, the Neapolitan side.

“We need to win both, otherwise, we try to play the playoff and then go to the next round,” remarked Maresca, whose next appointment is a match against an Everton team whose recent consistency has propelled them to the surprising position of seventh in the domestic league.

Side Stories

Notable Comment: “You know, it’s somewhat ironic because his biggest dream was me turning pro in golf. That was his biggest dream. So when I was 10, he forced me to start on golf. So I practiced every week from when I was 10 to 13” – Erling Haaland revealed how, had his dad got his way, he could have been teeing off rather than scoring goals in the top flight.

Fan Correspondence

“So, no wonder Wolverhampton Wanderers are in such a poor situation. 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” – a correspondent.

“I note that one correspondent not only got Tuesday’s featured letter, but also a mention in another reader's letter. On a night where both clubs from Sheffield again surrendered points after leading, I am wondering: could Sheffield be proving that the regularity of representation in your letters section is inversely proportional to the success of anything our teams are accomplishing on the field?” – a different supporter.