A Mourinho-less Chelsea travel to the Britannia to face Stoke City in the Sky Sports Saturday night football this weekend, but how have the Blues faired in previous fixtures against the Potters?
It was only 11 days ago that the Blues last made the trip up North on a brilliantly clichéd, cold, wet Tuesday night in Stoke. That game finished 1-1 in the original 90 minutes thanks to a last-minute Loic Remy equaliser, but Mark Hughes’ side ran out winners in the penalty shoot-out following nine goals from the 10 spot kicks taken between the two teams.
Since Stoke joined the Premier League in the 2008/2009 season, Chelsea have won half of the eight ties that have taken place at the Britannia, with last week’s Capital One Cup fixture being the only anomaly from the seven previous Premier League match-ups.
From the 7 league fixtures between the two, Chelsea have taken 14 points from a possible 21, losing just one game, which came in Mourinho’s first season of his second spell, where an Andre Schurrle brace was not enough to cancel out goals from Crouch, Ireland and a screamer in the dying minutes from Oussama Assaidi.
In this fixture last season, the Blues ran out comfortable 2-0 winners courtesy of an early John Terry header and a Cesc Fabregas goal to hand Mourinho an early present heading into the Christmas fixture congestion.
Perhaps the most memorable trip to the Brittania occurred in the 2012/13 season, when Eden Hazard added to a brace of own goals from Jon Walters (who also missed a penalty in the game) with this sensational effort which flew past a familiar face in the Stoke City goal – Chelsea ran out comfortable 4-0 winners.
With Jose Mourinho serving his one-match stadium ban, Chelsea will be looking to improve on a good performance in the week, but make no mistake in thinking that Stoke – regardless of a poorer start than Hughes would have hoped for – won’t make the Blues work for it.
Combined XI (Based on form)
Butland; Azpilicueta, Zouma, Shawcross, Johnson; Matic, Adam, Willian, Bojan, Arnautovic, Walters