Why Chelsea fans should not expect academy starts tonight despite Rosenior squad statement | OneFootball

Liam Rosenior has hinted at playing some young players in the FA Cup today, but we’re not predicting any starts.

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In the buildup to tonight’s game against Wrexham, Chelsea manager Liam Rosenior mentioned the two academy players he’s brought with the squad for the game.

But we’re not holding our breath expecting to see either Jesse Derry or Ryan Kavuma-McQueen today. If you look at the team we picked for the last round, where we faced Hull City, it was a surprisingly strong selection from Rosenior.

Liam Rosenior’s Hull selection gives clues over Wrexham plan

The side was Sanchez, James, Fofana, Sarr, Hato, Caicedo, Santos, Neto, Estevao, Garnacho, Delap.

That was essentially the strongest available team at the time, with just Enzo Fernandez, Joao Pedro and Cole Palmer rested. We don’t see any reason he would do anything different today, given it’s a round later in the competition and the opposition could be even tougher.

There will of course be differences to that lineup given injuries, suspensions and load management picture has changed since last month

But if we’re able to rack up some goals early on, we could see the youngsters in the second half. Derry came on after 77 minutes in the last round after the Blues went 4-0 up. Shim Mheuka joined him in the 88th minute. We’d expect a similar deal today.

In other news…

As well as the pair brought in the squad today, Rosenior also commented on the “scary” talents from the academy who had been training with the first team.

The Chelsea boss also said that tonight’s opposition will be “hard to play against,” which is why we don’t expect heavy rotation.

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