Real Betis vs Chelsea: Three factors that could decide the Conference League final

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·28 May 2025

Real Betis vs Chelsea: Three factors that could decide the Conference League final

How Wroclaw clash will be won and lost

Chelsea are looking to end a run of Spanish dominance in European finals when they meet Real Betis in the Conference League final in Wroclaw.

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Spanish teams have won every final they have contested against non-Spanish opposition in UEFA competition stretching back to the 2001-02 season, with the only defeats coming in games between two LaLiga sides. On top of that, the Spanish national team have also won all three European Championship finals they have contested in that time.

Chelsea, though, are out to make history as the first team to add the Conference League to Europa League and Champions League triumphs.

Something will have to give - and here’s how the match could be won and lost…

Antony factor

If Chelsea’s loan move for one Manchester United winger in Jadon Sancho has not entirely worked out then Betis’s for another could hardly have been more of a success.

Antony has scored nine goals since joining Real Betis in January

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Antony has been a revelation since joining the Spanish side in January, scoring nine goals and registering five assists across competitions.

The winger - who has been called up to Carlo Ancelotti’s first Brazil squad - has been particularly potent in the Conference League and scored key goals in both legs of the semi-final victory over Fiorentina.

It will be down to Marc Cucurella, quietly one of Chelsea’s players of the season, to keep him quiet this evening.

Jackson ‘debt’

Nicolas Jackson is a lucky boy on two fronts.

Lucky that his red card at Newcastle this month did not kill Chelsea’s Champions League hopes, with his team-mates defying his absence through suspension to beat Manchester United and Nottingham Forest and secure a fourth-placed finish.

Nicolas Jackson was sent off at Newcastle in his last game for Chelsea

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And lucky, too, that Enzo Maresca’s striking options are such that he seems certain to come straight back into the side tonight, with the manager suggesting he owes a “debt” to his team-mates.

The question, of course, is of how sharp the Senegalese will be having gone two-and-a-half weeks without a game, particularly since he had only just rediscovered his rhythm after two months out with a hamstring problem when picking up that foolish red card.

Chalobah motivation

Trevoh Chalobah can count himself unlucky to have lost his place in Chelsea’s Premier League side over the last couple of weeks.

Trevoh Chalobah is set to return to the Chelsea team

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The centre-back had started seven league games in a row, with his performances enough to earn a surprise first England call-up, but Maresca opted for Tosin Adarabioyo’s physicality against Rasmus Hojlund and Chris Wood in the Blues’s final two games.

That should at least mean Chalobah comes back into the XI tonight to try to shackle Cedric Bakambu, the second-top scorer in the competition this season on seven goals.

The 25-year-old has more motivation than most to finish the season with a winners’s medal, having missed out on Crystal Palace’s FA Cup success by virtue of his January loan recall.