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While The London club avoided a total demolition of their hopes of ending up in the top eight of the continental tournament group stage, they executed a targeted blow on their own hopes of waltzing straight into the knockout stages. Of course, the good news is that in the short one-year history of the recently revamped tournament, securing a place in the top eight isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.

The Core Problem: A Monotonous Lack of Consistency

Sadly for the club's supporters, the sole predictable element about the Chelsea team is a monotonously predictable inconsistency, which has been widely discussed since their loss in Bergamo. After apparently rubber-stamping their credentials with an commanding victory of Barcelona, and then a feisty stalemate with Arsenal, the team have been stuffed by Leeds, played out a dull draw at Bournemouth and have now lost against a average team from Italy's top flight.

While critics have been quick to lay the blame on a selection policy that appears to see the coach change his lineup like a kebab shop’s elephant leg of doner meat, the Chelsea head coach maintains that, knack and naughty step permitting, the core of his first eleven for games against strong opposition is largely set in stone.

“In my view in that game, starting team, we had inside the pitch eight, nine players that featured against Spurs, they played against Barcelona, they played against Wolverhampton, the Gunners,” he droned. “We had most of the regulars that are the ones playing every time for these kind of games. So if you look at the several alterations that we did from the previous game, it’s a different situation.”

What Comes Next

For a genuine opportunity of avoiding the Bigger Cup playoff round, they will have to be victorious in their remaining two matches. In the first, they host this season’s surprise package a Cypriot team, before heading back to Italy to face the Serie A champions, Napoli.

“Victories in both are required, if not, we try to play the playoff and then go to the next round,” sniffed the Italian coach, whose next appointment is a match against an Merseyside team whose recent consistency has propelled them to the surprising position of seventh in the Premier League.

Side Stories

Notable Comment: “You know, it’s somewhat ironic because his greatest wish was me becoming a professional golfer. That was his ultimate ambition. So when I was 10, he pushed me to start on golf. So I played golf every week from when I was 10 to 13” – a star striker explained how, if his father had his preference, he could have been teeing off rather than scoring goals in the Premier League.

Readers' Letters

“Well, no wonder Wolverhampton Wanderers are in such a poor situation. As any longtime reader of this column will know, the only good pre-match protests involve marching from a pub that the supporters intended to visit anyway, to the ground that they were always going to. Just showing up 10 minutes late? That’s how long it takes fans to get to their seats anyway” – a correspondent.

“I note that a reader not only got the previous featured letter, but also a mention in a separate letter. On a night where both clubs from Sheffield once more dropped points after leading, I am led to ponder: could the city be proving that the regularity of representation in your letters section is inversely proportional to the value of anything our teams are achieving on the field?” – a different supporter.