Chelsea – Bournemouth SOCCER PICKS
Chelsea and AFC Bournemouth meet at Stamford Bridge in the Carabao Cup. Given the shape of The Cherries, this duel must normally be a piece of cake for the Chelsea by Maurizio Sarri.
Chelsea:
At Chelsea they are not really waiting for this kind of duels. For The Blues it’s nice when they get far in the Carbao Cup. However, it has no priority. If Sarri does not win anything this season with Chelsea then it is always mentioned that he was also eliminated prematurely in the successor of the League Cup. In short: Sarri can not ignore the tournament completely. Especially now that Chelsea is in the quarterfinals. The timing of the duels, however, does not lie in front of Chelsea, it is already very busy. That sometimes causes The Blues to lose points. For example, as it did six times in the Premier League. In that competition, Chelsea is only in fourth place. The chance that Sarri in his first season so the title picks is not very big.
The game of Chelsea is not always convincing. That sometimes causes The Blues to drag the points with the heels over the ditch. Like last weekend against Brighton & Hove Albion. While visiting the Amex Stadium, Chelsea took a 0-2 lead through goals by Pedro and Eden Hazard. After 66 minutes of play, however, Brighton made the tie and in the remainder of the game, the equalizer hung in the air. However, Chelsea managed to win the victory and that is ultimately the only thing that counts.
AFC Bournemouth:
For Bournemouth, the Carabao Cup is of course an ideal opportunity to win a prize. In the Premier League that will happen so The Cherries must have success in cup competitions. Preferably in the FA Cup, but if Bournemouth gets far in the Carabao Cup, the fans of The Cherries will be fine too. For the time being, that is going well. So Eddie Howe’s team is in the quarterfinals of the Carabao Cup, but that also seems to be the end station. In this form it must be a bit crazy if Bournemouth wants to book a result on Stamford Bridge on Wednesday evening.
The Cherries lost six of their last seven games. Only the home game with Huddersfield Town (2-1) was won by Bournemouth. The other duels were all lost. Strikingly, Bournemouth did not only score top teams in those other six matches. In the majority of the duels though. For example, Manchester United, Manchester City, Arsenal and Liverpool were the opponents of Bournemouth in recent weeks. Last weekend, Bournemouth visited Wolverhampton and at the Wolves, Howe’s team lost 2-0. Because of the defeats of the past few weeks, Bournemouth dropped to eleventh place.
