After a thrilling climax to the Premier League season, the Conference League final against Manuel Pellegrini’s Real Betis leaves us with a chance to snatch a first trophy under Enzo Maresca and try to sign off the season in style.
If you check out the odds on Bet442, you’ll see the Blues are heavy favourites. They clock in at around 1.4 decimal odds of winning the trophy. That gives them an implied probability of about 70%, meaning Betis are given just a 30% chance.
We’re not foolish enough to argue with the bookies, but there are still plenty of reasons to not get overconfident ahead of a game like this.
For one thing, this game is being played in Poland at a neutral stadium. While Chelsea’s home form has carried them through the last couple of months, playing away from Stamford Bridge thing aren’t so pretty.
In the Premier League, since beating Spurs in early December, our away record is as follows: draw, loss, draw, loss, loss, loss, loss, draw, win, loss. So that’s W1, D3, L6.
In the Conference League things look a lot better, but in terms of quality and wage bill, Betis are closer to a Premier League team than they are to the likes of Legia Warsaw or Djurgardens.
As well as our shocking away record, there’s also a question of complacency. We’ve cruised through this competition with a minimum of fuss since August, brushing opposition away despite using a B team. Of course Maresca will pick his strongest team for this game (although we already know that Filip Jorgensen will be in goal, and there could be other tweaks), but there’s still a worrying chance that our players think this is going to be another cake-walk.
Betis may not be Bayern Munich, but they’re not Shamrock Rovers either. They’ve lost just twice since late February, and will have the advantage of a longer break before Wednesday night’s final, having closed out their league campaign on Friday, while Chelsea didn’t play until Sunday – something manager Maresca wasn’t happy about.
Despite all this, there really should be no excuses. Our budget and our squad value dwarfs our Andalusian opposition, and while it’s important not to underestimate them, we should also be sure to go out and play with the confidence of such heavy favourites. Let’s put on a show to end the season.
