Europa League action and the tournament favourites Chelsea will look to make it 3 wins from 3 in the competition as they host Belarusian BATE Borisov. Both of Chelsea’s wins in UEL were 1-0 wins against PAOK and Mol Vidi who surprisingly made it a very tough game on Chelsea whereas BATE beat Mol Vidi away from home but got smashed by PAOK 1-4 at home which means they need to somehow pick up points against Chelsea to stay in the race for knockouts.
Key Facts
Chelsea are yet to be beaten in all competitions this season. 9W 3D
Chelsea have kept 6 clean sheets in 12 games this season having only conceded 8 goals. They’ve not conceded in UEL yet.
Chelsea are unbeaten at Stamford Bridge outside of UCL in European competition. 29W 7D 0L
Ross Barkley has gotten on the scoresheet in 2 consecutive games for Chelsea. Man in form.
7 of 12 Chelsea games had over 2.5 goals this season.
BATE have conceded 8 goals in their last 4 games.
BATE have played 8 games in european competition including qualifiers. They won 2 drawn 2 and lost 3. They beat and drew with HJK and Qarabag and got beaten by PSV twice and PAOK conceding 10 goals in their 3 defeats. Struggles against tougher competition.
Excluding qualifiers, BATE have lost 10 of their last 13 away European games. 1W 2D.
Team News
Chelsea: Eden Hazard will be out with a back injury and Jorginho too for rest purposes. Sarri has used strong lineups so far during the Europa League, we’ve also seen youth mixed in like Loftus Cheek and Christensen who have both started in the last EL match. We can expect both of them to start. Hudson Odoi will likely not feature as Sarri has preferred the experienced Pedro and Willian on the wings in this competition and even if Sarri sits one of the two, there still is Victor Moses who we’ve seen Sarri prefer over Hudson Odoi in the rotation. We saw Morata Start during the weekend, so probably Giroud will be the starting striker choice here.
BATE Borisov: There are no new injuries to report from the BATE Borisov camp.
Betting Tips and Predictions
In this match we can definitely expect Chelsea to win. Whether it’ll be comfortable it’s another question. Realistically you’d have to think that it will be a walk in the park for the Blues but it really depends how long it’ll take them to break BATE down. If Chelsea can get an early goal they’ll win comfortably if not then it may be another 1-0. We do believe that Chelsea will dominate here and win easier than last time. First pick being -2 AH. BATE are not showing good defensive form right now and they have been leaking goals as soon as competition is tougher. Chelsea will be the ultimate test for BATE. Another pick is Chelsea to win to nil with lesser odds. BATE shouldn’t pose much threat as Chelsea have been decent defensively. Expect this to be a 3-0 win for the blues!
Match Odds (TonyBet)
Chelsea Win – 1.13
Draw – 8.35
BATE Borisov Win – 21.50
KICK OFF – 25th October 2018 – 8pm UK Time
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