The Christmas period is always busy for football fans, and it can make or break your season.
Recent years have seen Chelsea really struggle in December, and we’ve seen consecutive years where promising starts fell apart as the festive period got into gear.
This year, things have been going so badly in the buildup to Christmas that we might be about to see the opposite. Our hardest fixtures came in October and November, but they’re easing off now, and we have some really winnable games coming up.
If you want to back Chelsea to make the European places, this would be the time to do it. We’re still stuck down in midtable and the odds will be nice and juicy, but with games coming thick and fast both for us and for the teams above us, that can turn around quickly. You can see the odds at this site (or as they say in Thai, trang web này), and decide for yourself whether you like our chances.
Maybe it’s just the unexpected euphoria of having won a few games recently, but these easier games and the return to fitness of Christopher Nkunku (who is playing the Jesus role of returning saviour in this particular Christmas tale) is convincing us that Chelsea might just be able to turn the corner here.
Crystal Palace, Luton and Fulham are our next 3 opponents in the league, and it’s perfectly feasible we get 9 points from those games. Those around us have tough games, and we could jump up a couple of places in the league pretty easily. Brighton, Man U and Newcastle will all need to be overtaken, but all three are having the kind of winter spell that Chelsea usually do.
We will need Nkunku to hit the ground running of course, but if he does, we could be in business. Ben Chilwell and Romeo Lavia are close to a return too, and we will soon be able to field the strongest team we have all season, at least in theory.
The pressure is on Mauricio Pochettino, there’s no denying it. Both Frank Lampard and Graham Potter have lost this job in recent years after going into a winter tailspin, and even Thomas Tuchel struggled to recover following an injury aided collapse in his second season. We’re not sure how much attention Pochettino paid to those records, but he will certainly be seeing these upcoming games as not only winnable, but absolutely essential in terms of trying to recover this season and turn it into a positive campaign.
