GW 31: Everton vs. Chelsea

This weekend, in a week with only 5 Premier League games, we have an exciting fixture on Sunday between Everton and Chelsea. Both teams have incredibly talented sets of players and high class managers, yet for some reason they happen to both be struggling at the same time with the teams performing well below expectations at the moment, particularly in the league. Chelsea are currently well ahead of Everton in the table with the sides 20 points apart, and this is a trend that we’ve seen over the past few seasons with Chelsea mostly dominating this fixture, as they’re unbeaten in their last 5 Premier League matches and last 6 in all competitions against the Merseyside team. The last 2 though have been 0-0 draws, including the reverse fixture between them that was played earlier on in the season. In this match, Everton defended well against a Chelsea side who at this stage were playing some really good football, and it was clear that Everton were aiming for this sort of result as they didn’t push on in favour of the win, only managing 6 shots, all of these coming from pretty poor areas. Expected goals had the match at 1.16 to 0.20 in Chelsea’s favour showing that although Chelsea probably deserved to win, they didn’t have too many chances and Everton kept them away from promising positions for the majority of the game. Although this upcoming match will probably be similar in many ways to the one that was played earlier on, the fact that it will be played at Goodison Park this time round could make a difference.

Everton started the season off promisingly but recently they’ve seen a massive decline in form, falling outside the top 10 and into 11th, which is well off what they would’ve hoped to achieve. They’ve only won 1 match from their last 6 while losing 4 of these and this period has included a run off 3 losses on the bounce a few weeks ago, as they’ve been consistently bad over the last few gameweeks. Although many people might think it’s their defensive instability that's costing them like it has in the past, their attack has actually been much worse as they’ve only managed 6 goals in this period while failing to score in 3 of these matches that they played and they’ve  really struggled to break down the bigger sides. In Everton’s last match they suffered a dramatic defeat at the hands of Newcastle as they were up 2-0 until the 64th minute and maintained their lead until the 81st while shortly after, Newcastle delivered the fatal blow in the 84th minute to win 3-2. In this game they had to face a very different threat that they will in this match though, as Newcastle were highly focused on creating confusion inside Everton’s box, while you’d expect Chelsea to continue on with their passing philosophy with more carefully planned moves. Everton will definitely need to improve on their ability to sit in, as in the Newcastle match they tried to hold their lead by playing defensively which ended up costing them dearly, and if they try to hold Chelsea to another goalless draw here they could endure similar problems.

Idrissa Gueye will be absolutely crucial in ensuring this defensive solidity as he has been not only the top defensive player in the Everton squad this season but also one of the best in the entire league as he has the 2nd most successful tackles in the Premier League after only Aaron Wan-Bissaka. He is making an incredible 6.4 tackles and interceptions per 90 and although some of this is due to the amount of pressure that Everton face in the midfield you can take nothing away from his individual brilliance, especially in his game awareness and positioning that allows him to be defensively involved so frequently. Chelsea have a number of creative threats and the obvious one that Everton will have to watch out for is Eden Hazard and with Gueye placed in right defensive midfield, he could be in the perfect position to stop Hazard, as from the left wing he often likes to drift deeper and more centrally, sometimes to the point where he ends up on the other side of the field. To have someone of Gueye’s tackling ability going up against Hazard is a blessing of sorts as Hazard loves to complete lucrative dribbles and if Gueye can stop this successfully, Chelsea might lose some of their attacking edge. Andre Gomes is another defensive midfielder who could prove to be crucial for Everton as, sitting next to Idrissa Gueye, his defensive quality will also be needed but perhaps more importantly his ability to transition the ball from back to front could lead to counter attacking opportunities. He is currently making 54 passes per 90 while also completing nearly 2 dribbles so he could be the player that initiates attacks for Everton and allows them to play on the break.

Chelsea have had an extremely rocky season with title hopes at the beginning which faded quickly into them looking like the worst side in the top 6, to now, where they are still looking quite poor, however, they seem to have passed the biggest slump in their season. They have recovered slightly to stay unbeaten in their last 3 Premier League matches but they’ve haven’t been at their best in any of these, getting a lucky victory over Spurs before narrowly beaten 19th place Fulham and, in their last Premier League match, they drew 1-1 with Wolves after a late Eden Hazard goal. Although Wolves did score the first goal in the match, which makes Chelsea look a bit lucky to have obtained a draw, Chelsea were actually far more dominant in the match as they took 22 shots to Wolves’ 2. When you look at these shot numbers it looks like Chelsea were robbed of what should have been a clear win but actually expected goals shows that the match was quite even as the metric predicted a 1.05 to 0.61 scoreline which shows that Chelsea were shooting from all the wrong areas. The highest xG value for one of Chelsea’s individual shots was 0.12 while Wolves’ was 0.58, highlighting that Chelsea were struggling to break down a compact defensive side which could happen again in their upcoming match. To fix the problems with creativity that Chelsea have been having lately, they could bring in one of their more advansive midfielders like Barkley or Loftus-Cheek and possibly even drop Jorginho although that’s very unlikely to happen, while they also could bring in young prospect Callum Hudson-Odoi to inject some fresh energy into the side.

One player who will undoubtedly play in this fixture is Eden Hazard as his star quality has brought his side through so many matches, including their last fixture against Wolves. He has 13 goals and 11 assists thus far in the Premier League making him the top player in both categories for this Chelsea side, but it’s not only his incredible goal contribution rate that makes him so special. He is also making 3.6 successful dribbles per 90 making him not only one of the best dribblers in the league but also in the entire world as his dribbling ability has often provided match winners for his side. The problem that Hazard has faced very frequently this season though, is that he’s having to do most of the work by himself, which is shown by is dribble numbers, and maybe Ruben Loftus-Cheek could remove some of this burden if he gets a start. When Loftus-Cheek has played, he has often combined well with Hazard and with Hazard loving to drift inside, the fact that Loftus-Cheek has played as a wide player in the past means that he can fill the gap that Hazard leaves on the left. He has only played 433 Premier League minutes with only 1 start to his name but in this time he has been hugely impressive scoring 3 times while also taking 2.3 shots and making 4.4 dribbles per 90, however, these numbers are certainly skewed by the limited amount that he’s played. Although it’s not very likely that he does start the match, he’ll definitely be in contention due to Chelsea’s lack of creativity recently, and he could prove to make a difference.

In terms of injuries and suspensions neither team is struggling too badly, as has been the case for both sides over the majority of the season. Everton will only be missing 2 players from their senior squad for this match, however, both of these players, Jagielka and Zouma, have been important throughout the season and considering that they both play centre-back, these injuries could provide some big problems. Although Mina should be available for this match to partner Keane at the back, Marco Silva hasn’t preferred the Colombian recently as he’s only played 713 minutes in the league while Zouma has played 1983 minutes. Along with this, Marco Silva has come out publicly to say that he wants to see “more consistency from Mina during training” if he wants to start more frequently, sending a clear message that Silva would rather have some of his other options available. Chelsea have even less in the ways of injuries as everyone in the Chelsea squad looks likely to be present for this match. However, Zappacosta has a slight knock while Higuain has recently struggled from a small illness that could rule him out and while Zappacosta’s injury doesn’t pose much of a problem for Chelsea, missing Higuain could hurt their chances.

Neither team come into this match in great form but with Chelsea seemingly on a slight rise over the last few weeks while they also have a massive point advantage over their opponents, you can see why they might be favoured to win the match. Saying this, Everton are at home for this fixture where they’ve managed 7 more points than when they’ve been away, and given the last match between the sides ended in a draw, you would be right not to discard Everton too early on, even with their poor form. With Everton most likely playing with a very deep block for this match, it will be hard for them to advance against such a possession based side and, unlike against some of the other top sides, Everton’s counter attacking opportunities will definitely be limited, meaning we could see another low scoring match like we have in seasons gone by. This is further emphasized by the fact that Chelsea have actually kept clean sheets in 5 of their last 6 matches against Everton and although the initial reaction from the Merseyside side will be to sit deep, they might find more success from pushing onwards, especially when they’re at home, in order to find any attacking threat. I do think that Chelsea’s possession play will hold them back for most of the game though and that’s why I’m predicting a 1-1 scoreline.