Chelsea vs Aston Villa

Stamford Bridge is the venue as Chelsea and Aston Villa go head-to-head in a handsomely-looking Premier League showdown.

New Chelsea owner Todd Boehly took his total outlay since acquiring the club from Roman Abramovich to over £1bn in the transfer window just finished, only to see his side experience their worst five-game Premier League start since 2015/16 (W1, D2, L2). Last weekend’s tepid 0-0 draw against Bournemouth condemned the ‘Pensioners’ to a second straight scoring blank in the Premier League, casting further doubt on Mauricio Pochettino’s managerial credentials. Ominously for the Argentine, the last Chelsea manager to have endured a similar start couldn’t last until Christmas, highlighting the significance of winning this match. However, Chelsea’s three-game H2H league form against Aston Villa at the Bridge cannot inspire much confidence (W1, D1, L1). Neither can the fact they’ve only won once in their last ten top-flight outings in West London!

On a more positive note for Chelsea, Aston Villa come into this fixture looking to pick up the slacks following an underwhelming 3-2 defeat to Legia Warsaw in their opening Europa Conference League game in midweek. Unai Emery’s side did a stellar job bouncing back from a 3-0 rout at the hands of Liverpool on their most recent Premier League travel with a 3-1 thumping of Crystal Palace last weekend. But consistency hasn’t been their strong suit this season. None of their five league games thus far have ended as a draw (W3, L2), with each contest (won/lost) yielding at least a two-goal margin, suggesting this could go either way. While the ‘Lions’ will hope to take advantage of Chelsea’s rotten patch, they must deal with problems of their own, having lost two of their three Premier League travels this season by at least a three-goal margin after conceding multiple first-half goals.