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Although Chelsea didn't entirely destroy their hopes of ending up in the top eight of the continental tournament group stage, they performed 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 recently revamped competition, achieving a top-eight finish isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.

The Central Issue: A Monotonous Lack of Consistency

Unfortunately for the club's supporters, the sole predictable element about the Chelsea team is a reliably erratic lack of consistency, which has been much remarked upon following their defeat in Italy. Since apparently rubber-stamping their credentials with an impressive beat-down of a European giant, and then a feisty stalemate with a London rival, Chelsea have been stuffed by Leeds, played out a dull draw at the south coast club and have now been beaten by a average team from Serie A.

Although critics have been quick to lay the blame on a selection policy that seems to see the coach rotate his team like a kebab shop’s elephant leg of doner meat, the manager insists that, knack and naughty step permitting, the core of his first eleven for big matches is largely set in stone.

“I think tonight, starting team, we had inside the pitch the majority of the team that featured against Spurs, they played against Barca, they played against Wolves, the Gunners,” he stated. “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 escaping the additional knockout round, they will have to win their remaining two matches. First up, they welcome this season’s surprise package a Cypriot team, before heading back to Italy to face the Serie A champions, the Neapolitan side.

“Victories in both are required, if not, we will face the playoff and then go to the next round,” remarked Maresca, whose next appointment is a game against an Everton team whose recent consistency has taken to them to the surprising position of the top half in the Premier League.

Side Stories

Quote of the Day: “You know, it’s somewhat ironic because his greatest wish 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 played golf every week from when I was 10 to 13” – Erling Haaland explained how, if his father had his preference, he could have been teeing off rather than tearing it up in the Premier League.

Readers' Letters

“So, no wonder Wolverhampton Wanderers are in such a sad state. 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 ground that they were always going to. Just arriving 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 the previous featured letter, but also a name check in another reader's letter. On a night where both Sheffield teams again surrendered points after leading, I am wondering: could the city be proving that the regularity of appearances in your mailbag is inversely related to the value of anything our teams are accomplishing on the field?” – another fan.