Chelsea v West Ham United
Football : England, Premier League 2009/2010
Saturday 13th March 2010, kickoff 3pm

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Chelsea

Last 5 Chelsea games at Home :W4-D0-L1 F16-A7

For the first time in a long time, Chelsea go into a Premiership game not at the summit of the table. Currently sitting in second, Carlo Ancelotti’s men have 61 points but trail new leaders and Premiership champions Man United by 2 points. The positives are that Chelsea have played a game less, the negative is that in order to go top Chelsea must keep winning and that brings great pressure.

In the last league home game, Chelsea were humiliated losing 4-2 two with 9 men against the up and coming Man City, thankfully for them this was a rare bad day at the office for the blues who still boast a formidable home record this term.

With 14 games played at home. Chelsea have 12 wins which gives them the second best home record in the league, when comparing this form to last year Chelsea have found their winning ways at Bridge after a lot of dropped points in the 08-09 campaign After 14 home games last year Chelsea has 7 wins, 5 draws and 2 defeats, Ancelotti has made Stamford Bridge a fortress again and despite the loss to City, he will be expecting 3 points on Saturday.

The Chelsea overall form since February has been scrappy at best, in 5 games they only have 2 wins with 2 defeats as well! Ok, 3 games were on the road but even so that is not good enough for a title push and if they draw/lose again on Saturday they might find themselves in third by the end of the day.

This might be me being picky, but a real problem is the lack of clean sheets for Chelsea, particularly in this recent run. In the two games that they shut their opponents out they won, many will say that’s obvious but it’s not, when keeping a clean sheet Chelsea has won 12 of 13 games. For me it starts at the back with this side and if they look water tight as they did in the recent cup win against Stoke (won 2-0) then there is much less pressure at the other end.

Chelsea’s defence is very unpredictable at the moment and it’s got nothing to do with Cech being out, they have looked shaky since Cole broke an ankle and Terry’s off the field problems interfered with his on the field job. The only positive is that last week Terry was brilliant against Stoke and Ferraria looked much better at left back compared to using stand in Malouda who to be fair was doing an ok job with Cole out.

Interestingly is that Chelsea don’t have many 1-0 wins, in fact they have just one this season beating Man United 1-0. I make this point because of late unless Chelsea scores 2 or more, they are not winning games, they scored 2 at home to City and lost! One at Everton and lost, 1 at Hull and drew with 2-0 wins over Arsenal and Wolves in there as well. The old Chelsea could win 1-0 but i don’t think this one can, and with Zola’s attacking West Ham coming to town Chelsea may need to score at least 2 again if they are to take 3 points on Saturday.

Team news is that Cech is still out as are other long termers Essien, A.Cole and Bosingwa. Doubts include Zhirkov who can’t shift a calf injury and Carvalho, the centre back was absent last week in the cup win over Stoke and with Alex playing really well that day I think we will see just one change to the side with Ballack returning to the side following his suspension. Also back is Belletti but he is likely to only make the bench. Late news is that Hilario also has an injury so third choice keeper Turnbull makes his Premiership debut.

Predicted Chelsea Lineup :
Turnbull, Ivanovic, Alex, Terry, Ferreira; Mikel, Ballack, Lampard, Malouda, Anelka; Drogba.

West Ham

Last 5 West Ham Games Away :W0-D2-L3 F2-A8

Gianfranco Zola’s men are having a year to forget, languishing in 16th place on 27 points which is just 3 points above the relegation zone. Given that 19th placed Hull are on 24 points and 13th Sunderland are on 30 every point definitely counts and West Ham need to start picking up away points if they want to survive this season. The next away day is at second placed Chelsea on Saturday.

The Hammers boast the 15th best away record this season with 1 win from their away travels and 5 draws, this time last season they had the 8th best with 4 wins and 5 draws from 14. Looking at the stats West Ham are taking a point in 43% of their away games whilst Chelsea are giving up points in just 14 % of their home games, statistically it doesn’t look good for Zola’s men.

The away form in detail shows that West Ham last won on the opening day of the season at Wolves, since then it’s been downhill. The draws have come at Blackburn (straight after the Wolves game so they did go 2 away games unbeaten), Sunderland, Hull, Aston Villa and Portsmouth. The last draw came against Pompey in January which is not good, going 2 months without an away point.

Also looking at West Ham's recent matches, only the Villa result is anywhere near on par with the task facing them on Saturday. All the other teams there are midtable/relegation candidates, when West Ham have only faced one “top 4 club” away and lost 3-0(Man United only 2 games ago!). Statistically this does not bode well for Zola on his second return to the Bridge.

The bright spark and most likely to make an impact at the Bridge is Diamante, the Italian is having a great debut season in the Premiership and is the clubs second top scorer with 8 goals and trails ex-Chelsea striker Cole by 1 goal. Diamante has 2 goals in his last 4 games but he makes an impact with his creativity as well, when he ticks so do West Ham and in the reverse fixture he scored for West Ham in the 1-1 draw at Upton Park. I remember that well, he caused the Chelsea back line a lot of problems and if can repeat his display from that game West Ham could be in with a shout of taking something on Saturday.

Team news is that Boa Morte, Davenport, Hines and key midfielder Noble are out. In Noble’s absence the place is being fought between Dyer, Collison and Stanislas who will partner Parker and Kovac in the middle of the park. At the back both Illunga and Faubert have a chance of making the starting eleven but the noise out of Upton Park suggests they will sit this one out. Whilst up front McCarthy has returned to training this week and should at least make the bench.

Predicted West Ham Lineup :
Green, Daprela, Upson, Gabbidon, Spector; Parker, Behrami, Kovac, Diamanti; Franco, Cole.

The Betting Verdict

Chelsea has looked far from convincing of late but last week’s win against Stoke did look very “textbook” at this stage of the season.

The Blues will happily take a grinding narrow victory win and I think that’s the most likely result here, especially given that Chelsea host Inter Milan in a huge midweek Champions League game a few days later.

The Statistics :

The Pick :

Chelsea 2-1 West Ham United

PERCENTAGE ESTIMATE :

Chelsea 73% - Draw 20% - West Ham 7%

FIXED ODDS BETTING :

Take Chelsea to win and 1.30 at Pinnacle is acceptable (main bet)

HANDICAP BETTING :

Consider at Chelsea by 1 goal margin at 4.20 ad Ladbrokes