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While The Blues didn't entirely destroy their chances of ending up in the top eight of the European competition opening phase, they executed a precise, surgical strike on their own chances of strolling directly into the knockout stages. Naturally, the silver lining is that in the short one-year history of the new and not-necessarily-improved tournament, achieving a place in the top eight isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.

The Central Concern: A Predictable Lack of Consistency

Sadly for the club's supporters, the only consistent thing about Enzo Maresca’s side is a monotonously predictable lack of consistency, which has been much remarked upon following their loss in Italy. After apparently rubber-stamping their quality with an impressive beat-down of Barcelona, followed by a feisty stalemate with a London rival, Chelsea have been stuffed by a Championship side, played out a snoozy stalemate at Bournemouth and have now lost against a mid-table side from Serie A.

While pundits have been eager to point the finger on a selection policy that appears to see Enzo Maresca rotate his team constantly, the Chelsea head coach maintains that, injuries and suspensions aside, the core of his first eleven for big matches is mostly fixed.

“I think tonight, starting team, we had inside the pitch eight, nine players that play against Spurs, they play against Barca, they played against Wolverhampton, Arsenal,” he droned. “There were most of the regulars that are the ones consistently selected for matches of this magnitude. So if you see the five changes that we did compared to Bournemouth game, it’s different.”

What Comes Next

To have any realistic chance of avoiding the additional knockout round, they will have to win their final two group games. In the first, they welcome this season’s surprise package Pafos, then travel back to the continent to face the Italian title holders, the Neapolitan side.

“We need to win both, if not, we will face the extra round and then go to the following stage,” sniffed the Italian coach, whose following fixture is a game against an Everton team whose recent consistency has propelled them to the surprising position of seventh in the domestic league.

Other Notes

Notable Comment: “You know, it’s somewhat ironic because his greatest wish was me becoming a professional golfer. That was his ultimate ambition. So when I was 10, he pushed me to start on golf. So I practiced every week from when I was 10 to 13” – a star striker explained how, if his father had his preference, he could have been teeing off rather than scoring goals in the top flight.

Fan Correspondence

“So, no wonder Wolves are in such a poor situation. As any longtime reader of this column will know, the only good pre-match protests involve marching from a public house that the supporters intended to visit anyway, to the ground that they were inevitably going to. Just arriving 10 minutes late? That’s how long it takes fans to get to their seats anyway” – a correspondent.

“I note that one correspondent not only got Tuesday’s letter o’ the day, but also a name check in another reader's letter. On a night where both Sheffield teams again dropped points after leading, I am led to ponder: could the city be proving that the frequency of appearances in your mailbag is inversely proportional to the value of anything our teams are accomplishing on the field?” – a different supporter.