Chelsea made seven changes to their team today from the side that beat AC Milan in midweek, causing a few nerves amongst fans who were worried about how the shuffled team would look.

In the end, the team played extremely well regardless, so those fears were wasted. But it wasn’t just a case of rotation from Graham Potter. As he explained in quoted picked up by Football.London, some of those changes which had been assumed to be voluntary were actually enforced.

Potter revealed that Thiago Silva had had a heavy cold, which he played through in midweek, but was enough to keep him out today.

Graham Potter on risking it with seven changes:

"Thiago has had a heavy cold but played against Milan. With two days to recover, that was short so we didn't want to take the chance. Three games for Ben Chilwell wouldn't have been the smartest thing to do."

[via @AdamNewson]

— Absolute Chelsea (@AbsoluteChelsea) October 8, 2022

In this case of Ben Chilwell, who is still on the road to full fitness after a serious injury, he was left out as Potter admitted that it “wouldn’t have been the smartest thing” for him to play.

The good news is that with Marc Cucurella in the squad, we have a perfect backup for Chilwell at all times.