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Although The Blues didn’t completely torpedo their hopes of ending up in the highest eight places of the Bigger Cup opening phase, they performed a precise, surgical strike on their own hopes of waltzing straight into the knockout stages. Of course, the silver lining is that in the short one-year history of the recently revamped competition, securing a place in the top eight may not be as crucial as it seems.

The Central Problem: A Predictable Lack of Consistency

Sadly for the club's supporters, the only consistent thing about the Chelsea team is a monotonously predictable lack of consistency, which has been widely discussed since their loss in Italy. After apparently rubber-stamping their quality with an commanding victory of Barcelona, followed by a bad-tempered draw with a London rival, Chelsea have been stuffed by a Championship side, played out a snoozy stalemate at Bournemouth and have now been beaten by a average team from Italy's top flight.

Although pundits have been quick to lay the blame on a selection policy that appears 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 starting lineup for games against strong opposition is mostly fixed.

“I think in that game, first XI, we had inside the pitch eight, nine players that play against Tottenham, they play against Barca, they play against Wolverhampton, the Gunners,” he droned. “There were eight, nine players 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 different.”

What Comes Next

To have any realistic chance of avoiding the additional knockout round, Chelsea will have to win their final two group games. In the first, they host the unexpected contenders a Cypriot team, before heading back to Italy to face the Serie A champions, the Neapolitan side.

“Victories in both are required, otherwise, we try to play the playoff and then progress to the following stage,” remarked the Italian coach, whose following fixture is a game against an Merseyside team whose current form has propelled them to the surprising position of the top half in the Premier League.

Other Notes

Quote of the Day: “You know, it’s actually funny because his greatest wish was me turning pro in golf. That was his biggest dream. So when I was 10, he pushed me to start on golf. So I practiced every week from when I was 10 to 13” – a star striker explained how, if his father had his preference, he could have been on the golf course rather than scoring goals in the Premier League.

Fan Correspondence

“Well, no wonder Wolverhampton Wanderers are in such a sad state. As any regular reader of this column will know, the only effective pre-match protests involve walking from a pub that the supporters planned to be at 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 see that one correspondent not only got Tuesday’s featured letter, but also a name check in a separate letter. On a night where both Sheffield teams once more dropped points after leading, I am led to ponder: could the city be proving that the frequency of representation in your mailbag is inversely proportional to the success of anything our teams are accomplishing on the field?” – another fan.