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Although Chelsea didn't entirely destroy their hopes of ending up in the highest eight places of the European competition group stage, they performed a precise, surgical strike on their own chances of waltzing straight into the knockout stages. Naturally, the good news is that in the short one-year history of the recently revamped competition, achieving a place in the top eight may not be as crucial as it seems.

The Core Problem: A Predictable Lack of Consistency

Sadly for Stamford Bridge regulars, the only consistent thing about Enzo Maresca’s side is a reliably erratic lack of consistency, which has been much remarked upon since their defeat in Bergamo. Since apparently rubber-stamping their quality with an commanding victory of Barcelona, and then a bad-tempered draw with a London rival, Chelsea have been defeated by a Championship side, played out a dull draw at the south coast club and have now lost against a mid-table side from Italy's top flight.

Although critics have been quick to lay the blame on a selection policy that seems to see Enzo Maresca change his lineup constantly, the manager insists that, injuries and suspensions aside, the core of his first eleven for big matches is mostly fixed.

“I think tonight, first XI, we had on the field the majority of the team that featured against Tottenham, they play against Barca, they played against Wolverhampton, Arsenal,” he droned. “There were eight, nine players that are the ones consistently selected for matches of this magnitude. So if you look at the several alterations that we did from the previous game, it’s different.”

What Comes Next

To have any realistic chance of escaping the Bigger Cup playoff round, Chelsea will have to be victorious in their final two group games. In the first, they welcome this season’s surprise package a Cypriot team, before heading back to the continent to face the Serie A champions, Napoli.

“Victories in both are required, if not, we try to play the extra round and then go to the next round,” remarked Maresca, whose following fixture is a match against an Merseyside team whose current form has taken to them to the dizzy heights of seventh in the domestic league.

Side Stories

Notable Comment: “You know, it’s actually funny because his biggest dream was me becoming a professional golfer. That was his biggest dream. So when I was 10, he pushed me to take up golf. So I played golf every week from when I was 10 to 13” – a star striker revealed how, if his father had his preference, he could have been teeing off rather than tearing it up in the Premier League.

Readers' Letters

“So, no wonder Wolves are in such a sad state. As any regular reader of this column will know, the only good pre-match protests involve walking from a public house that the supporters planned to be at anyway, to the ground that they were inevitably going to. Just showing up 10 minutes late? That’s how long it takes fans to get to their seats anyway” – one reader.

“I note that one correspondent not only got the previous featured letter, but also a name check in a separate letter. On a night where both Sheffield teams again dropped points after leading, I am led to ponder: could Sheffield be proving that the frequency of appearances in your mailbag is inversely proportional to the success of anything our teams are achieving on the field?” – a different supporter.