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Huddersfield Town vs Chelsea FC

BPL 2018-19 – Huddersfield Town vs Chelsea FC Match Preview




Chelsea open up their season and the new era under Sarri at Huddersfield. After finishing 5th and having another terrible title defence, the Blues will look to have a resurgent season by getting back into the Champions League for next season. Meanwhile Huddersfield are in for another relegation battle, this is their second season and after defying the odds last year they will look to do the same again this year.


Huddersfield Town


Who would’ve thought that this team would be in the Prem after mostly every pundit predicted them to finish rock bottom. The terriers proved to be a hard working side under David Wagner and that hard work earned them Premier League safety. However, coming into the new season we can expect Huddersfield to be towards the bottom again as they will hope to defy the odds again. Huddersfield have made some decent signings in Sobhi, Diakhaby, Mbenza and Durm primarily as these players will all be expected to be playing a key part in Huddersfield’s 2nd season in the Premier League. These additions should hopefully help Huddersfield improve their attack and defence which they were pretty poor at and the fact that they manager to survive by being a poor defensive side and not a very good attacking side was really impressive but it’s highly unlikely that it can repeat. Huddersfield open up the campaign against Chelsea, an incredibly tough start but Huddersfield have shown that they can compete with Chelsea last season when they drew with them at the Bridge to secure safety so Huddersfield are no strangers to stunning the Blues. Coming into this game Huddersfield are massive underdogs, but we must not underestimate their capabilities of picking up points, especially at home.


In terms of team news, the Terries are pretty healthy, most first team players are expected to play while the new signings Ramadan Sobhi and Adama Diakhaby are expected to start too meanwhile Mbenza is still under a question mark while Durm is definitely out. We can expect Huddersfield to set up defensively of course since they’re facing a much more skilled opposition and they will have to work really hard to pick up points here. Counter attacking play style is the best way for Huddersfield to really get something out of this because if they get into an end to end game with Chelsea they’ll get destroyed. We know for sure that Huddersfield players will leave everything out there on the pitch, it’s just that the talent difference between them and Chelsea is so huge where hard work may not even be enough. Huddersfield are the rightly named underdogs and they will need a miracle to get something out of this game.


Chelsea FC


It’s a new era at Chelsea. After Conte being let go, Maurizio Sarri has taken over and we can expect Chelsea to play attacking based football after many years of employing defensive managers. Now, we shouldn’t expect this to work right away, it will take time to get used to the new system but once that happens, we can expect Chelsea to be a very fun side to watch. Chelsea have had a very good transfer window especially towards the end by signing Kovacic and Kepa Arrizabalaga (Courtois replacement). They’ve also signed a very talented midfielder in Jorginho and the potential midfield trio of Kante, Kovacic and Jorginho sounds very intriguing and they have a back up midfield 3 of Cesc Barkley and RLC who can all impact games so midfield is definitely going to be a huge strength for Chelsea. Losing Courtois doesn’t seem like so crucial now that they signed Kepa, who is a very talented young Spanish goalkeeper who represented his nation already only at age 23. The most important thing that Chelsea have done is keep Eden Hazard. Keeping their star man was absolutely huge as he looks to take the new BPL season by storm under an attacking system and having a very strong midfield behind him. One worry about Chelsea is a lack of clinical goal scorers with Morata struggling, Tammy being too young, Giroud not really a goal scorer and Michy gone on loan. Other than that, Chelsea have a very good squad all around and we need to look out for some of the youngsters breaking through, primarily Callum Hudson-Odoi. Coming into this game against the Terries, Chelsea will be expected to dominate and win, after all they are a far superior side and whether they field the strongest side or slightly weakened, it should not affect the outcome.


In terms of team news for this game. Obviously Batshuayi is out of contention after being loaned out and we will probably see Morata start up front. Kante, Hazard, Giroud and Cahill have only trained for a week so far so all of them could be coming off the bench due to a possible lack of fitness. All four of them featured in Chelsea’s friendly game on Monday against Lyon playing about 20-25 minutes, but we still shouldn’t expect them to be guaranteed starters as it will take time for them to regain their full fitness and one week is clearly not enough. In a scenario where Hazard and Kante may come off the bench, we should expect Barkley or Cesc and 17 year talent Hudson-Odoi to fit in. There’s also a question mark over Willian and Pedro, but this is up to Sarri to choose who he wants to start with both being fit enough to start. Defensively, Chelsea will most likely play the same back 4 as in community shield with Alonso Rudiger Luiz and Azpilicueta, but it’s not confirmed yet and we could very well see Christensen and Emerson slot in after impressing in the final friendly for the struggling Alonso and Luiz. And finally concerning Kovacic and Kepa. Both players are eligible to play, Kepa is expected to start but Kovacic will probably come off the bench as he’s not had much training time either. Chelsea will play a 4-3-3 formation. They on paper are far superior side and they will be expecting to win this game, whether Hazard and Kante start or not, either way at worst they will come of the bench and if things go wrong they can have their 20-25 mins cameos against tired legs and it should be more than enough to turn the game around if things go wrong. Winning start is key for Chelsea and Sarri here.


What to Expect


A Chelsea win is definitely something we should expect. Whether we see the main guys starting or coming off the bench, Chels simply have too much for Huddersfield. Players like Hudson-Odoi, Barkley can definitely slot in for Hazard and Kante and be impact players as we’ve seen throughout the pre-season, especially Hudson who was incredible in pre-season even against the top sides. It will be very important for Morata to be clicking because the guy can be very good on his day and we expect him to score at least one goal to start the season. Huddersfield will fight, grit, grind as usual but sometimes that just isn’t enough against the top sides and it should be the case this time around. Chelsea will dominate the possession, continuously attack and will eventually break the home side down to win the game. We predict a 0-2 Chelsea win with Morata being one of the goal scorers.




Match Odds (Pinnacle)


Huddersfield Town Win – 6.35


Chelsea Win – 1.621


Draw – 4.04



KICK OFF – 11th August 2018 – 3pm UK Time

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