PMB: Chelsea v Swansea City - talking points After away games in the league and the cup it is back to the Bridge this weekend. Club historian Rick Glanvill and club statistician Paul Dutton set the scene for the Swans in SW6…
From Chelsea Fc
TALKING POINTS
This feels like a big week for Chelsea Football Club. Three of the past four league games away from home have resulted in points dropped, yet the Blues have one point more than at the same stage in 2014/15, the last time we won the league.
As seems the way of things at the moment, Swansea City come to Stamford Bridge a resurgent team, playing with some urgency for their new manager. The Welshmen are unbeaten in their past three Premier League games against the Blues – our last win was the 5-0 at the Liberty Stadium that title-winning season.
Antonio Conte will have impressed on his players that there is no room for complacency. Mute the Swans this weekend, take three points, and all the pressure moves to the other teams vying for a UEFA place. A trio of them have no league action this weekend, and Liverpool do not play until Monday.
Victory on Saturday would reduce the maximum number of points required by Chelsea to lift the Premier League trophy to 29, with 12 games remaining. There is no easy walk to the title, though: heroism will still be required.
‘If someone thinks the Swansea game is easy, they make a great mistake,’ our head coach has said. It is a warning fans must take on board, too. Everyone needs to push the players relentlessly all the way over the last third of the campaign, especially at Stamford Bridge.
KEY STAT
Chelsea are aiming to equal our club record of 12 successive home wins in all competitions, previously recorded in 2008/09-2009/10, and 2014/15.
While the Blues are reaching for the stars, this weekend’s visitors are clambering to escape the basement. Just five points separate the Swans in 15th from bottom-feeders Sunderland.
There is a strong Chelsea connection at the Glamorgan club. January’s Premier League Manager of the Month, Paul Clement, was on the Cobham coaching staff for 17 years (apart from a spell at Fulham). Wandsworth-born ‘Clem’ began coaching the club’s schoolboys in 1994, then worked with our Academy teams from 2005.
He was promoted to the first team staff under Guus Hiddink in 2009, and after the role was made permanent by incoming coach Carlo Ancelotti, Clement helped Chelsea to the league and cup double in 2010.
After Chelsea, Clement briefly worked under Steve Kean at Blackburn before reuniting with Ancelotti at Paris Saint-Germain, Real Madrid and, following an ill-fated spell as Derby’s head coach, Bayern Munich.
His fellow assistant at PSG was the great Claude Makelele – so definitive as a defensive midfielder for the Blues between 2003 and 2008 that they named the role after him. Maka is now on Clem’s staff in Wales. Welcome home, both.
With no sign of a winter break coming into Premier League thinking, clubs with no FA Cup involvement took it upon themselves to have a jolly-up in the sun last week. Everton and West Ham flew to Dubai, for instance, while Liverpool and Bournemouth jetted off to Spain, and Hull to Portugal. Peculiarly, Sunderland took the long haul to New York.
Paul Clement resolved to continue his intensive ‘hard week, easier weekend’ training regime with the 15th-place team at Swansea’s Fairwood base.
Sunday’s FA Cup draw was interesting for two reasons. Firstly, because it handed Arsenal arguably the easiest passage to Wembley since the game turned professional, and secondly because the first two balls out of the bowl imposed a return to west London on former Blues manager Jose Mourinho.
Mourinho has a decent record against previous clubs. In 21 matches with former employers (Benfica, Chelsea, Porto, and Uniao de Leiria), he has won 12 and drawn five, losing four. The most recent, however, will concern him: United’s league trip to Stamford Bridge ended in a 4-0 defeat for the Portuguese and his men.
Now that Watford in mid-March are standing aside for our FA Cup quarter-final with Manchester United at the Bridge, the next two league games after Swansea are tricky trips to West Ham and Stoke, before (subject to TV selections) Crystal Palace, on All Fools’ Day, and Manchester City, four days later, are the visitors.
Chelsea’s upcoming workload, in common with Arsenal and Liverpool, looks positively light compared that facing three of our top-six rivals, as this table shows
This feels like a big week for Chelsea Football Club. Three of the past four league games away from home have resulted in points dropped, yet the Blues have one point more than at the same stage in 2014/15, the last time we won the league.
As seems the way of things at the moment, Swansea City come to Stamford Bridge a resurgent team, playing with some urgency for their new manager. The Welshmen are unbeaten in their past three Premier League games against the Blues – our last win was the 5-0 at the Liberty Stadium that title-winning season.
Antonio Conte will have impressed on his players that there is no room for complacency. Mute the Swans this weekend, take three points, and all the pressure moves to the other teams vying for a UEFA place. A trio of them have no league action this weekend, and Liverpool do not play until Monday.
Victory on Saturday would reduce the maximum number of points required by Chelsea to lift the Premier League trophy to 29, with 12 games remaining. There is no easy walk to the title, though: heroism will still be required.
‘If someone thinks the Swansea game is easy, they make a great mistake,’ our head coach has said. It is a warning fans must take on board, too. Everyone needs to push the players relentlessly all the way over the last third of the campaign, especially at Stamford Bridge.
KEY STAT
Chelsea are aiming to equal our club record of 12 successive home wins in all competitions, previously recorded in 2008/09-2009/10, and 2014/15.
While the Blues are reaching for the stars, this weekend’s visitors are clambering to escape the basement. Just five points separate the Swans in 15th from bottom-feeders Sunderland.
There is a strong Chelsea connection at the Glamorgan club. January’s Premier League Manager of the Month, Paul Clement, was on the Cobham coaching staff for 17 years (apart from a spell at Fulham). Wandsworth-born ‘Clem’ began coaching the club’s schoolboys in 1994, then worked with our Academy teams from 2005.
He was promoted to the first team staff under Guus Hiddink in 2009, and after the role was made permanent by incoming coach Carlo Ancelotti, Clement helped Chelsea to the league and cup double in 2010.
After Chelsea, Clement briefly worked under Steve Kean at Blackburn before reuniting with Ancelotti at Paris Saint-Germain, Real Madrid and, following an ill-fated spell as Derby’s head coach, Bayern Munich.
His fellow assistant at PSG was the great Claude Makelele – so definitive as a defensive midfielder for the Blues between 2003 and 2008 that they named the role after him. Maka is now on Clem’s staff in Wales. Welcome home, both.
Paul Clement resolved to continue his intensive ‘hard week, easier weekend’ training regime with the 15th-place team at Swansea’s Fairwood base.
Sunday’s FA Cup draw was interesting for two reasons. Firstly, because it handed Arsenal arguably the easiest passage to Wembley since the game turned professional, and secondly because the first two balls out of the bowl imposed a return to west London on former Blues manager Jose Mourinho.
Mourinho has a decent record against previous clubs. In 21 matches with former employers (Benfica, Chelsea, Porto, and Uniao de Leiria), he has won 12 and drawn five, losing four. The most recent, however, will concern him: United’s league trip to Stamford Bridge ended in a 4-0 defeat for the Portuguese and his men.
Now that Watford in mid-March are standing aside for our FA Cup quarter-final with Manchester United at the Bridge, the next two league games after Swansea are tricky trips to West Ham and Stoke, before (subject to TV selections) Crystal Palace, on All Fools’ Day, and Manchester City, four days later, are the visitors.
Chelsea’s upcoming workload, in common with Arsenal and Liverpool, looks positively light compared that facing three of our top-six rivals, as this table shows
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