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Although The Blues avoided a total demolition of their chances of finishing in the highest eight places of the Bigger Cup group stage, they performed a precise, surgical strike on their own chances of automatically qualifying for the knockout stages. Naturally, the good news is that in the brief history of the recently revamped competition, securing a place in the top eight isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.

The Central Concern: A Monotonous Inconsistency

Unfortunately for the club's supporters, the only consistent thing about the Chelsea team is a reliably erratic inconsistency, which has been much remarked upon since their loss in Bergamo. After apparently rubber-stamping their credentials 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 dull draw at Bournemouth and have now lost against a average team from Italy's top flight.

While pundits have been eager to point the finger on a team selection approach that appears to see the coach change his lineup incessantly, the Chelsea head coach insists that, knack and naughty step permitting, the nucleus of his starting lineup for big matches is mostly fixed.

“I think tonight, first XI, we had on the field the majority of the team that play against Spurs, they play against Barca, they played against Wolverhampton, Arsenal,” he stated. “There were most of the regulars that are the ones playing every time for these kind of games. So if you look at the five changes that we did compared to previous game, it’s a different situation.”

The Path Forward

To have any realistic chance of avoiding the additional knockout round, Chelsea will have to win their final two group games. First up, they welcome the unexpected contenders Pafos, then travel back to Italy to face the Serie A champions, Napoli.

“We need to win both, otherwise, we will face the extra round and then progress to the following stage,” remarked Maresca, whose following fixture is a match against an Everton team whose recent consistency has propelled them to the dizzy heights of the top half in the domestic league.

Other Notes

Notable Comment: “You know, it’s somewhat ironic because his biggest dream was me becoming a professional golfer. That was his biggest dream. So when I was 10, he pushed me to take up golf. So I practiced every week from when I was 10 to 13” – Erling Haaland revealed how, if his father had his preference, he could have been teeing off rather than tearing it up in the Premier League.

Readers' Letters

“Well, no wonder Wolves are in such a poor situation. As any regular reader of this email will know, the only good pre-match protests involve walking from a public house that the supporters planned to be at anyway, to the ground 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” – a correspondent.

“I note that one correspondent not only got the previous featured letter, but also a name check in a separate letter. On a night where both clubs from Sheffield again dropped points after leading, I am led to ponder: could the city be proving that the regularity of appearances in your mailbag is inversely proportional to the value of anything our teams are accomplishing on the field?” – a different supporter.