Chelsea must end strange hoodoo to prove title credentials | OneFootball

Blues aim to change history as Leeds clash marks start of key run

More revealing, though, will be whether he is still all smiles when December gives way to the New Year. This next month will tell us an awful lot about whether Chelsea are likely to go the distance in a title race. Maresca said it himself.

Leeds away signals the start an unforgiving period of eight matches in December alone, and Chelsea will play the same number of games in January, too.

But the step over the threshold into December comes with historic baggage and plenty of precedent for an unwanted halting of the Blues’ momentum.

Chelsea face Leeds at Elland Road on Wednesday

REUTERS

Dating back to (and including) the 2019-20 season, Chelsea have taken just 56 points from a possible 102 in the league in the intervening Decembers, in a month that tends to prove just a bit too hectic for Chelsea to maintain consistently impressive performances and results.

Sure enough, on Tuesday Maresca harked back to Boxing Day last year, when Chelsea — sitting pretty in second place in their first season under the Italian — conspired to lose 2-1 at home to west London rivals Fulham. From there, form fell away and it took a herculean effort in the final weeks of the season to climb back up to fourth and secure a return to Champions League football on the final day.

Maresca has so far been unwilling to enter into title race discussions where his Chelsea side are concerned, but is now at least accepting that the topic becomes unavoidable if his team are still within touching distance of the top come Spring.

“The teams that are able to be consistent in December, in January, are the teams that go in for [it] very much. They're going to be there for the title,” he said.

“That's why now the main focus is trying to be consistent in the next month. If we are able to survive and be there in February or March, for sure we’re going to be there [among the contenders]. But, now, I don’t know where we’re going to be in February.”

Chelsea have won more games, scored more goals and accrued more points away from home this season, and yet they have played one match more at Stamford Bridge than on their travels.

Chelsea are six points behind Arsenal after their 1-1 draw with the Premier League leaders on Sunday

Chelsea FC via Getty Images

Maresca believes this can be “no coincidence”, that “for sure, there is something there.” This is the sort of statistic that would usually have the potential to eat away at Maresca, whose obsession with consistency is challenged by such a quirk. But the festive period this year will be as relentless and exhausting as ever. “We need to analyse it,” he said. “The problem is that in this moment it's very complicated to stop and analyse the games.”

Instead, on Chelsea go into three consecutive away games against Leeds, Bournemouth and Atalanta, only the last of which they will be able to count on arguably their most important player for. Moises Caicedo must serve his three-game domestic ban for his red card against Arsenal. Cole Palmer, though, is back and raring to go after bench-warming on Sunday.

Maresca and Chelsea can slip deliberately under the radar for the moment, but the head coach would rather be having those title conversations come March than be out of contention due to another substandard set of results in the final month of the year.

The first of eight mini-milestones on the road to ending their December hoodoo arrives tonight in Leeds, where on their last visit, in 2022, Chelsea were whacked 3-0. Nobody said it was going to be easy.