Anurag Singh
Chelsea will return to Champions League action on Tuesday evening when they face Dynamo Kiev at the Olimpiyskiy Stadium. The win can help them overhaul their opponents while a defeat might put them in danger of early elimination from this year’s Champions League. The rough start to the season continued for Chelsea on matchday 2 in the Champions League as they lost toFC Porto in Portugal. Matchday three provides an opportunity for Dynamo and Chelsea to make a statement. The Blues recorded a 2-0 home victory over the Villans to end a three-match winless run and moved five places up in the Premier League table to 11th.
A lot of people have blamed as Chelsea try to comprehend this rocky start to the season. Senior defenders like Cahill and Terry have had take a huge share of the blame and the midfield partnership of Nemanja Matic and Cesc Fabregas has come into question regularly and Mourinho occasionally has shifted the blame to the referees. The manager was particularly critical of Hazard, who was Chelsea’s player of the season last time and left him on the bench last weekend. they will be aiming to keep up the momentum gained after the win against Aston Villa ahead of a trip to West Ham United next weekend. Mourinho will be without injured pair Thibaut Courtois and Branislav Ivanovic for the trip to Ukraine. Ruben Loftus-Cheek could keep his place in the side after featuring against Villa while Eden Hazard could return in the starting eleven after he was named on the bench on Saturday.
Dynamo Kiev will go into this game on the back of a league loss, but it was only a minor blip in what has been an excellent run. Their 3-0 loss to Shakhtar Donetsk on Friday was their first defeat in 38 Ukrainian Premier League outings, but Dynamo manager will be hoping it fires up his side, which leads to a better performance against Chelsea. Sergei Rebrov’s side began by holding Portuguese giants Porto to a 2-2 draw in Kiev three weeks ago. Then, they cruised to a 2-0 win over Maccabi Tel Aviv to move into the top two places in the group. Dynamo coach Rebrov could be without key midfielder Serhiy Rybalka, who is out of action with a small tear of the muscle.
Predicted Dynamo Kiev Line-up: Shovkovskiy; Silva, Dragovic, Khacheridi, Antunes; Rybalka, Veloso, Garmash; Gusev, Yarmolenko and Kravets
Predicted Chelsea Line-up: Begovic; Azpilicueta, Terry, Cahill, Rahman; Loftus-Cheek, Fabregas; Hazard, Oscar, Willian, and Costa.
Predicted scoreline: 1-2
Keys stats
This is the first ever competitive game between Dinamo Kiev and Chelsea.
Dinamo Kiev’s last Champions League win against an English side was in October 2003 versus Arsenal (2-1). Since then, they have won none of their last five (D1 L4).
Chelsea’s only previous encounter with a Ukrainian side was against Shakhtar Donetsk in the 2012/13 Champions League group stages. They lost 2-1 away from home before securing a 3-2 win at Stamford Bridge.
