Feature

The Big Question: Are Chelsea genuine title contenders?

By Ben Bloom 8 Dec 2024
BigQ

As Enzo Maresca continues to rule his side out, Ben Bloom assesses whether Blues could yet challenge for top spot

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With Chelsea sitting in second place ahead of Sunday's London derby at Tottenham Hotspur, football writer Ben Bloom looks at whether they can push for the Premier League title.

He is in charge of the Premier League’s most in-form side, surging up the table and moving ever closer to the summit, but Chelsea manager Enzo Maresca remains adamant about the club’s championship aspirations - or lack of them.

“I don’t think we are there and ready to compete with Arsenal, Liverpool and Manchester City,” he reiterated on Friday, ahead of Sunday’s trip across London to face Tottenham Hotspur

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Unbeaten in their last six Premier League games and winning their most recent three with an aggregate score of 10-2, Chelsea have climbed above Arsenal and Man City into second place.

The gap to league leaders Liverpool is down to seven points, and the likes of Cole Palmer, Nicolas Jackson, Enzo Fernandez, Moises Caicedo and others are flourishing on a weekly basis.

Premier League

Position Pos Club Played Pl GD Points Pts
1 Liverpool LIV 19 +28 46
2 Arsenal ARS 20 +21 40
3 Nott'm Forest NFO 20 +10 40
4 Chelsea CHE 20 +15 36
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“We’ve got our Chelsea back,” was the chorus from the away fans at Southampton on Wednesday night as Maresca’s side thrashed the bottom club 5-1. But, still, the Italian refuses to accept that his team are in the title race.

“We are very happy for the fans,” he said. “They deserve to live this moment. They can dream, we are very happy. We work every day to make them happy and proud of the players. We have to do many more things good, not just score goals, avoid to concede.

“Defensively we are doing well but we are just focused on Sunday and then the next one. We are not thinking about April, May or June. It’s too early. Things can change quick in football.”

Is Maresca correct or are his protestations misguided? Are Chelsea actually genuine contenders for a first Premier League crown since 2017?

What the stats say

It is not so much that Maresca is surprised by Chelsea’s ability to perform in the manner of recent weeks; more that they are doing so at such an embryonic stage in his tenure.

“I was convinced we’d reach that moment but not so early,” he said. "We can do many things better in both situations – attacking and defending. We are ahead of my expectations.”

Chelsea have scored 57 times in 22 games across all competitions this season, already seven more goals than they managed in their entire 50-match campaign of 2022/23.

In fact, their current average of 2.6 goals per game is the highest in the club’s history.

Even aided by playing in Europe’s weakest continental competition – the UEFA Conference League – it has been quite some start to the Maresca era.

On Premier League statistics alone, there is little to suggest Chelsea sit any rungs below their title rivals.

While the numbers below show Chelsea cannot compete defensively with Arne Slot’s side, they are the Premier League’s leading attacking force, topping the goalscoring charts with 31 and also showing the way for shot conversion rate among the main four title contenders.

That is despite being the league’s unluckiest side, hitting the woodwork more times than any other team.

Top four clubs' key stats
  Liverpool Chelsea Arsenal Man City
Points 35 28 28 26
Goals 29 31 28 25
Shots 216 213 201 260
Shots on target 89 84 74 88
Shots con. rate % 13.4 14.6 13.9 9.6
Goals conceded 11 15 14 19
Clean sheets 7 3 5 3
Woodwork hit 9 11 2 8
Appetising run of fixtures

Things have undoubtedly been good, and there are signs that they could soon become even better given the relative ease of Chelsea’s fixtures into the new year.

Of their next eight opponents, Fulham sit highest in sixth after their win over Brighton & Hove Albion in midweek.

The trickiest match looks to be this Sunday against Spurs, but Chelsea will approach that fierce London derby with confidence from winning more matches at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium - five of the seven they have played there - since the ground opened in 2019.

In an upcoming festive period that treats all four main title contenders kindly, it is Chelsea and Man City whose fixture lists look most welcoming in comparison to some more obvious potential banana skins for Liverpool and Arsenal.

Here are the top four's next eight fixtures, and the league position of each of the teams they face, plus the average position of their opponents.

Fixtures and league position of opponents
Liverpool Chelsea Arsenal Man City
EVE (P-P) 15th TOT (A) 10th FUL (A) 6th CRY (A) 17th
FUL (H) 6th BRE (H) 11th EVE (H) 15th MUN (H) 13th
TOT (A) 10th EVE (A) 15th CRY (A) 17th AVL (A) 8th
LEI (H) 16th FUL (H) 6th IPS (H) 18th EVE (H) 15th
WHU (A) 14th IPS (A) 18th BRE (A) 11th LEI (A) 16th
MUN (H) 13th CRY (A) 17th BHA (A) 5th WHU (H) 14th
NFO (A) 7th BOU (H) 9th TOT (H) 10th BRE (A) 11th
BRE (A) 11th WOL (H) 19th AVL (H) 8th IPS (A) 18th
Ave. position: 11.5 Ave. position: 13.1 Ave. position: 11.3 Ave. position: 14.0
Building for the future

While he is at pains to point out that this might not be Chelsea’s season to reach the very top, Maresca has not hidden his bold future aspirations for a notably young squad.

“What I said to the owners and the sporting directors the first time I met them, because of the age, and because of how good the squad is, for me, Chelsea, in the next five to 10 years, will be one of the teams, or the team, that is going to dominate English football,” he said prior to his side’s thrashing of Southampton earlier this week.

“This is what I said to the club the first time I met them. 'No matter who will be the manager, for the next five or 10 years, because of the age, the squad, you can dominate English football,' and I still think exactly the same.”

Chelsea’s squad is the youngest in the Premier League by a considerable margin.

The average age of their starting players this campaign is 23 years and 234 days – more than two years younger than AFC Bournemouth and Spurs, who follow next in the list.

Indeed, while their average age will naturally increase as the season goes on, Chelsea could potentially challenge the youngest ever Premier League teams.

Youngest average starting XI over a season
Team Season Average age Final position
Leeds 99/00 24y 162d 3
Aston Villa 12/13 24y 174d 15
Arsenal 08/09 24y 225d 4
Chelsea 23/24 24y 233d 6
Liverpool 99/00 24y 247d 4
Burnley 23/24 24y 248d 19

That age could hinder them. According to Opta Analyst, no team have ever won the Premier League title with an average starting XI age under 25, and only three were under 26: Chelsea in 2004/05, Blackburn Rovers in 1994/95 and Man Utd in 1995/96.

That final instance was the first of United’s six Premier League crowns in eight seasons after Sir Alex Ferguson had sold a number of experienced older players and replaced them with a younger cohort of “Fergie’s Fledglings”.

They came to dominate English football for the best part of a decade.

History suggests Chelsea’s youthful nature might prove Maresca correct, with a sustained title challenge over the course of this current campaign proving beyond them.

But it is Ferguson’s model at Man Utd that the Chelsea manager would dearly love to replicate in seasons to come.

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