Team
news and stats ahead of Chelsea vs Wolves in the Premier League on
Wednesday; kick-off 6pm.
Team news
New Chelsea boss Thomas Tuchel will be in the Stamford Bridge dugout for
Wednesday's Premier League clash with Wolves.
The German head coach has replaced Frank Lampard at the Blues' helm and got
straight to work in west London on Tuesday night.
N'Golo Kante will be a doubt with hamstring trouble, but otherwise Chelsea
should have a relatively clean bill of health beyond.
Wolves are awaiting a work permit before new signing Willian Jose can link
up with the squad.
The Brazilian striker has joined on loan from Real Sociedad until the end of
the season but also needs a negative coronavirus test before he can travel
to England.
Manager Nuno Espirito Santo remains without Marcal (groin), Jonny (knee),
Morgan Gibbs-White (coronavirus) and Raul Jimenez (fractured skull), but
hopes Jonny will be back in two weeks.
Wolves can't catch a break. This fixture will have looked a lot more
appealing to Nuno Espirito Santo on Monday morning than it does now. Instead
of travelling to a confidence-drained, stuttering Chelsea side that looked
under-motivated with Frank Lampard in charge, it's now a completely
different scenario. Chelsea, you'd assume, will now be fully charged to
impress their new boss Thomas Tuchel.
Timo Werner could hardly trap or pass the ball properly against Luton.
Wolves will get to see the probable transformation into Diego Maradona up
close on Wednesday night.
A change of boss in the dugout is always a difficult one to analyse from a
betting view in the immediate aftermath. Tuchel is famed for his aggressive
and tactically astute style but working on assumptions without using
evidence is not a path to profit. I'll be sitting back and watching with
interest to see what Tuchel does with an undoubtedly richly talented, yet
out of form, squad of players.
What we do know is that Wolves are in toothless mood in the final third.
Recording just one shot on target against Chorley from the sixth tier of the
English football pyramid in the FA Cup took pragmatic football to another
level. A Chelsea win to nil makes sense, but it's predicted with absolutely
no confidence whatsoever.
JONES KNOWS PREDICTS: 2-0 (6/1 with Sky Bet)
Opta stats
Chelsea have won five of their six home Premier League matches against
Wolves (D1), winning 2-0 at Stamford Bridge last season.
Wolves, who were 2-1 winners at Molineux earlier in the campaign, are
looking for their first top-flight league double over Chelsea since the
1974/75 season under manager Bill McGarry.
Since their return to the Premier League in 2018, Wolves have earned 23
points from their 13 league games in London (W6 D5 L2) - only Liverpool (31)
and Manchester City (28) have won more away points in the capital in this
time.
Chelsea have lost seven home Premier League matches under Frank Lampard (P28
W15 D6 L7), as many as his predecessors Antonio Conte and Maurizio Sarri did
in 57 games combined (W40 D10 L7), while only Glenn Hoddle (17) and Claudio
Ranieri (11) have lost more Premier League games at Stamford Bridge as Blues
boss.
Chelsea have only lost their first two home top-flight matches in a calendar
year three times previously, and not since 1993 when they lost to Man City
and Sheffield Wednesday. The first time it occurred - in 1956 - their second
home defeat was against Wolves.
Wolves haven't kept a clean sheet in any of their last 12 Premier League
games, the longest current run in the competition. Wolves have conceded at
least twice in each of their last three league games, last having a longer
such run in the top-flight between February and April 2012 (nine games).
Wolves have only lost three consecutive league games under Nuno Espírito
Santo once previously, losing three in a row in October/November 2018.
Chelsea's Mason Mount has created 48 chances in 18 Premier League games this
season, only four fewer than he created in 37 games last season (52). Mount
is creating a chance on average every 32 minutes this season, the best ratio
by an Englishman to play at least five games in a season for the Blues since
Frank Lampard in 2009-10 (one every 28 mins).
In three league starts against Wolves, Tammy Abraham has scored six goals -
three for Bristol City in 2016/17 and a hat-trick for current side Chelsea
in September 2019; his two league appearances against them since scoring his
treble have been both as a substitute, playing just 31 minutes combined.
Wolves forward Fábio Silva is only the second teenager to score more than
once in the Premier League for Wolves, after Pedro Neto (also 2 goals). The
only Portuguese teenagers to score more than twice in the Premier League are
Ricardo Vaz Tê (3) and Cristiano Ronaldo (8).
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