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Although Chelsea didn’t completely torpedo their hopes of ending up in the highest eight places of the Bigger Cup opening phase, they executed a targeted blow on their own hopes of waltzing straight into the knockout stages. Naturally, the silver lining is that in the brief history of the new and not-necessarily-improved competition, achieving a place in the top eight isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.

The Core 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 widely discussed following their defeat in Bergamo. Since seemingly confirming their quality with an impressive beat-down of Barcelona, and then a feisty stalemate with Arsenal, the team have been defeated by a Championship side, played out a dull draw at Bournemouth and have now been beaten by a mid-table side from Serie A.

Although pundits have been quick to lay the blame on a selection policy that seems to see the coach change his lineup constantly, the Chelsea head coach insists that, knack and naughty step permitting, the nucleus of his first eleven for games against strong opposition is mostly fixed.

“In my view in that game, starting team, we had inside the pitch eight, nine players that featured against Spurs, they played against Barca, they play against Wolves, the Gunners,” he droned. “We had eight, nine players that are the ones consistently selected for matches of this magnitude. So if you see the several alterations 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 final two group games. In the first, they welcome this season’s surprise package Pafos, then travel back to the continent to face the Italian title holders, the Neapolitan side.

“Victories in both are required, otherwise, we try to play the extra round and then progress to the next round,” sniffed Maresca, whose next appointment is a game against an Merseyside team whose current form has propelled them to the surprising position of seventh in the Premier League.

Side Stories

Notable Comment: “You know, 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 forced me to take up golf. So I played golf every week from when I was 10 to 13” – a star striker explained how, had his dad got his way, he could have been teeing off rather than tearing it up in the top flight.

Fan Correspondence

“Well, no wonder Wolverhampton Wanderers are in such a poor situation. As any longtime reader of this column will know, the only good pre-match protests involve marching from a pub that the supporters intended to visit anyway, to the stadium that they were inevitably going to. Just showing up 10 minutes late? That’s how long it takes fans to get to their seats anyway” – one reader.

“I note that a reader not only got the previous letter o’ the day, but also a mention in a separate letter. On a night where both Sheffield teams again surrendered points after leading, I am led to ponder: could Sheffield be proving that the frequency of representation in your mailbag is inversely related to the value of anything our teams are accomplishing on the field?” – a different supporter.