Chelsea face Newcastle at St. James’ Park in just over an hour, and the teams are in! Enzo Maresca has left out a regular starters.
It’s pretty much a full strength first XI from Maresca, with only the injured Levi Colwill and Liam Delap unavailable. But there is one twist we didn’t see coming.
At the back it’s the steady group which have been doing well – Robert Sanchez in goal, with Malo Gusto at right back, Trevoh Chalobah and Wesley Fofana at centre back and Marc Cucurella at left back.
In midfield, as expected, Reece James plays alongside Moises Caicedo to add some extra physicality against a nasty Newcastle setup. But there’s no Enzo Fernandez playing with them – he’s left on the bench. We can only imagine this is a tactical decision.
Ahead of them, favoured wingers Pedro Neto and Alejandro Garnacho are on the flanks, while up top Joao Pedro leads the line and Cole Palmer plays in the hole.
Someone was always going to have to be left out to accommodate Caicedo’s return from injury, but we really thought it would be a three man midfield with an attacker out and Palmer playing wide or at false 9.
Enzo is hardly in the bad books, just not selected today. He will be hoping to make an impact off the bench.
It’s a big day for JP, who has a battle on his hands up top and needs to show he’s up for it.
Here are the full team line-ups for Newcastle vs Chelsea (kick off at 12:30 GMT)
CHELSEA:
In other news…
Chris Sutton has predicted us to lose this game today – and that’s not surprising given our record at St James’ Park.
It’s crazy to think that Enzo Fernandez – who signed less than 3 years ago – is now one of our first team’s longest serving players. He’s developing into a key dressing room leader.
