Chelsea (H) | Pre-Match Thread

[kaz7]

| Pep Guardiola on if Manchester City can land a psychological blow on Chelsea tomorrow ahead of the Champions League final. “Many things can happen, we are just focused

 

[applecentral]

Sterling had a very good first half vs Spurs, one of our best halves of football recently, and kept popping up in dangerous positions vs Palace. Sure, his finishing has let him down, but getting in goalscoring positions is a very important quality and a good basis to build on. He isn't hiding. For me, and I'm sure for Pep as well, Stetling is much closer to the first XI than Kun. Kun can't properly press. It doesn't really matter vs Palace, but in high-intensity games it's a big weakness. That's why we are letting him go. We can beat both the Palaces and the PSGs of this world without him. Hope he goes out on a high and scores some big goals though. Would be perfect.

I don’t want to write Sterling off but over the last few weeks his form has plummeted. It’s a shame though.

 

[kaz7]

Thomas Tuchel has confirmed Mateo Kovacic remains sidelined for Chelsea’s visit to #ManCity this weekend, but is the only injury absentee

 

[Akpowell]

Thomas Tuchel has confirmed Mateo Kovacic remains sidelined for Chelsea’s visit to #ManCity this weekend, but is the only injury absentee

But says they could make changes

 

[Legal Alien]

Pep Guardiola: "People might think the guys who played against Dortmund and Gladbach are going to play the #UCL
final. Right now, I don’t know. What I want is everyone involved in the next two or three weeks to prepare for the final

Sounds like he's going to rotate...

Ederson

Cancelo
Ake
Laporte
Mendy

Torres
Rodri
Bernardo
Sterling

Sergio
Jesus

 

[Marvin]

I don’t want to write Sterling off but over the last few weeks his form has plummeted. It’s a shame though.

Good signs against Palace away I thought. We've got 4 games before the CL final. It would be a boost to get Sterling back in goal scoring form particularly as one of the obvious weaknesses in the CHelsea team is their lack of speed at the back (Azpilcueta and Chilwell).

 

[applecentral]

I am all for giving Sterling a run on our next 3 hopefully dead rubber games, however against Chelsea in the title winning game I don’t feel we should risk playing him whilst his form is so poor.
To win the league we need every player to be bang on form.
That’s my humble opinion.

 

[MarsLlama]

Shame about Kovacic. I like when opposition teams waste spots in the XI on useless players who you don't have to worry about. That's what I love about Spurs- if you handle Son and Kane you're sorted. Moussa Dembele was a favourite of mine.

At least they've still got Jorginho, who looks much more concerned with setting records for most passes in a game than he does with creating a chance.

 

[Bellamy's Caddy]

I'm hoping there won't be huge changes from midweek. I get the argument for rotation, but if we win this game the league is done and we can afford to rotate and rest players for the remaining games, while putting more pressure on Chelsea to play their strongest team for the rest of the season. If we don't beat Chelsea, then we may still have won the league, but it drags on again until its confirmed.

 

[Benlee2022]

I think most players can handle a four day turnaround, but then again that game probably took a lot out of us.

I'd go with a slightly lighter rotation of KDB, Dinho, one of Foden or Mahrez, one CB, and one fullback.

So:

Ederson
Zinchenko
Dias
Laporte
Cancelo
Rodri
Gundogan
Bernardo
Foden
Jesus
Aguero

Chelsea's counter attack is so fast that we need walker.​