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Although The Blues avoided a total demolition of their prospects of ending up in the highest eight places of the continental tournament group stage, they performed a targeted blow on their own hopes of automatically qualifying for the knockout stages. Naturally, the silver lining is that in the brief history of the new and not-necessarily-improved competition, achieving a top-eight finish may not be as crucial as it seems.

The Core Problem: A Monotonous Inconsistency

Sadly for Stamford Bridge regulars, the sole predictable element about the Chelsea team is a monotonously predictable lack of consistency, which has been widely discussed since their loss in Italy. Since seemingly confirming their quality with an impressive beat-down of a European giant, and then a bad-tempered draw 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 Italy's top flight.

While pundits have been eager to point the finger on a team selection approach that appears to see Enzo Maresca rotate his team incessantly, the Chelsea head coach insists that, injuries and suspensions aside, the core of his starting lineup for games against strong opposition is mostly fixed.

“In my view tonight, starting team, we had inside the pitch the majority of the team that featured against Spurs, they play against Barcelona, they played against Wolverhampton, the Gunners,” he droned. “There were most of the regulars 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.”

What Comes Next

To have any realistic chance of escaping the additional knockout round, Chelsea will have to be victorious in their remaining two matches. In the first, they host this season’s surprise package a Cypriot team, then travel back to Italy to face the Serie A champions, Napoli.

“We need to win both, otherwise, we will face the playoff and then go to the following stage,” remarked the Italian coach, whose following fixture is a game against an Merseyside team whose recent consistency has taken to them to the dizzy heights of seventh in the Premier League.

Other Notes

Quote of the Day: “You know, it’s somewhat ironic because his biggest dream was me turning pro in golf. That was his ultimate ambition. So when I was 10, he forced me to start on golf. So I practiced every week from when I was 10 to 13” – a star striker 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 longtime 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 a reader not only got the previous featured letter, but also a mention in another reader's letter. On a night where both Sheffield teams again dropped points after leading, I am wondering: could Sheffield be proving that the frequency of appearances in your mailbag is inversely related to the value of anything our teams are accomplishing on the field?” – another fan.