Preview
The Champions League returns for the first time since December and Chelsea will be making the short trip to Paris to face PSG for the third consecutive season.
In our last two meetings Chelsea won the tie on away goals then in the second meeting PSG won, also on away goals. This shows how similar the teams are in terms of quality.
However this season Chelsea have massively underperformed and currently sit in the bottom half of the Premier League. This is in contrast to a PSG side who are a staggering 24 points clear of Monaco at the top of Ligue 1. Despite the lack of competition in France for PSG, 24 points clear is still an impressive achievement.
Chelsea certainly will be facing a PSG side who are stronger than when we have faced them before but we certainly have the quality in our squad to cause them problems.
It is crucial tonight we score an away goal and take a result back to Stamford Bridge which is still winnable.
Come on Chelsea!
Match details
Tuesday, 16th February, kick off: 7:45pm (UK Time) at the Parc des Princes on BT Sport Europe.
Recent form
PSG have won 4 of their last 5 games (St. Etienne, Lorient, Marseille and Lyon) and drawn 1 (Lille) in a game which saw them make 7 changes to rest players for tonight’s match. Their last defeat in all competitions came back in the group stage of the Champions League.
Chelsea remain unbeaten since our defeat to Leicester in the middle of December and have won 3 of our last 5 games in all competitions (Arsenal, MK Dons and Newcastle), drawing the other two to Watford and Manchester United.
Team news
Chelsea will be without Captain John Terry tonight after he picked up a minor hamstring and tendon injury against Newcastle. He completed training yesterday but tests after the session proved he wasn’t fit enough to play so he’s remained in England. Pato has also not travelled with the squad as he’s still not up to full match fitness, whereas our other new signing Matt Miazga has flown over to Paris to complete the squad. Academy product Jake Clarke-Salter will train with the first team for the rest of the season in Kurt Zouma’s absence and he is also in the travelling squad. Another player to have an injury which ruled him out of last weekends game was Oscar, he has overcome this and travelled too.
PSG have injury concerns of their own and two big names may miss tonight’s match. It will be touch and go to see if Veratti or Pastore will be fit enough to feature.
My predictionÂ
PSG 3-1 Chelsea.