For the second week in a row, Chelsea go into a match knowing that Tottenham have temporarily narrowed the gap. How will the Blues fare against Manchester United?
Chelsea visit Jose Mourinho’s new digs at the House Sir Alex Ferguson Built, hoping to sour his milk for the third time this season. Mourinho has already made plenty of excuses for Manchester United not being “fresh,” but that is about as surprising as the shape of the ball.
Tottenham cut Chelsea’s lead atop the Premier League to four points with a commanding win over the Nathan Ake-less Bournemouth yesterday. Ake will likely not even be a substitute today, as Conte’s most experienced XI + seven will hope to restore a seven point lead.
Our predictions on how things will play out:
Scott Brant: Manchester United 1 – 2 Chelsea. The business end of the season continues, and United are in the way this week. Mourinho will likely set up his XI to get a draw – he will not want to lose to Chelsea three times in one season. No change for Conte. They say the best players show up in big matches, so Diego Costa and Eden Hazard with the goals and dominating performances.
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Travis Tyler: 0 – 2. There is no reason to expect Mourinho to switch tactics from the FA Cup match. He will play an extremely narrow back four, have the wingers mark the wingbacks, the midfielders the midfielders, and have two attacking players roaming for the long ball. He will also instruct them to hack and slash, resulting in a red card early on and allow Chelsea to comfortably score with both teams playing 10 v 10 (because Costa can hardly count as the 11th player based on current form).
Ollie Miller: 1- 0. The pessimism is starting to creep in. Chelsea will see less of the ball than normal. Mourinho will be smarting from two fairly easy Chelsea wins in the previous two games. He feels he has a massive point to prove. The Blues will create their fair share of chances but with no striker it will be difficult for them to score. Spurs’ victory will pile big pressure onto Chelsea. Can they cope?
Rayna Sidhu: 0 – 1. Despite United’s unconvincing run recently, Mr. Chelsea Play Defensive Football will try to prove a point and make things difficult for the Blues. It will be hard to break through, but N’Golo Kante and Eden Hazard will both make the POTY decision 10x harder with outstanding performances. Hazard will get the goal in the first half and Chelsea will control the rest of the game.
Ben McDonnell: 1 – 1. United are draw specialists. Mourinho will want to spoil the party or at least have some say in diminishing Chelsea’s title hopes. A draw would not be too much of a bad result but it would be nice to beat Mourinho again.
Daniel Mcclue: 2 – 0. That loss to Palace is becoming more and more frustrating by the game. Spurs are absolutely relentless right now and Chelsea will start to feel the pressure. Mourinho somehow gets away with fielding 12 players and the numbers make the difference with Paul Pogba scoring twice. Despite the win, Mourinho blames the fixture congestion for only winning by two, singles out the referee for not giving them 16 penalties, one Blues fan for calling him Judas when “a more apt comparison would be to Jesus Christ himself”, and the tea lady for giving him three too many grains of salt.
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