Match Preview – Brighton v Chelsea

Chelsea – the team
Up until the turn of century, Chelsea were a London club playing in front of 10,000 people at a greyhound track in an affluent area of the capital. Along then came a bloke called Roman Abramovich who had made millions through not entirely legal means during the fall of the Soviet Union. With their new sugar oligarch, they’ve dominated the last decade or so of English football, lifting four Premier League titles, four FA Cups, three League Cups, two Community Shields, one Champions League and one Europa League. And they say money can’t buy you everything.

Chelsea- the place
Chelsea hail from the London Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham, an area containing three clubs – Chelsea, Fulham and QPR – in the top two tiers of English football despite being just covering just 6.33 square miles. That would be rather like Brighton being a Premier League side and Whitehawk and Mile Oak fighting it out in the Championship. They also have claims to come from Kensington and Chelsea which is a mismatch of highly affluent areas where property costs the GBP of a small African nation, shops such as Harrods and venues such as the Royal Albert Hall and at the other end of the scale, the Grenfell Tower.

Chelsea – the people
Given their status as the wealthiest area of the country, Chelsea have acquired all manner of celebrity supporters. These include Sir Richard Attenborough, Will Ferrell, Gordon Ramsay, Ed Sheeran, Ellie Goulding, Guy Ritchie, Charlize Theron, Jeremy Clarkson, Kate Hudson, Lily Allen, Mark Ronson, Sienna Miller and Emma Watson. None of these were ever seen at Stamford Bridge pre-Abramovich and none of them have ever been seen at Stoke City on a cold, wet and windy day in February. Which, given we’ve still got 1,000 unsold tickets for next months visit to the Bet365, sounds rather like a lot of our supporters as well.

A good WeAreBrighton.com memory of Chelsea at home
We’ve only ever seen Chelsea visit Brighton once and that was for a friendly in the summer of 2012 when the European Champions played their first game on English soil since that famous success in Munich. A side featuring the likes of Petr Cech, John Terry, Frank Lampard, Fernando Torres and new signing Eden Hazard had no answer to a Vicente-inspired Albion as Gus Poyet’s side ran out 3-1 winners. Vicente, Ashley Barnes and Andrew Crofts were on the score sheet and anyone who was there that day could see the Blues were in real trouble for the season ahead. Unsurprisingly, Robert Di Matteo ended up being sacked shortly afterwards.

A bad WeAreBrighton.com memory of Chelsea at home
We weren’t even born for this one, but Chelsea’s first ever league visit to the Goldstone in 1983 resulted in some of the worst crowd trouble the old ground ever saw. There were Blues supporters in every corner of the ground and at the final whistle, they invaded the pitch to fight the hopelessly outnumbered police and break the goal in front of the North Stand (not the last time that would happen). Seven police officers were injured in the fracas and Chelse player Chris Hutchings even decided to get involved, getting himself arrested after telling an officer to “f**k off” and running down the players tunnel after clapping the away support while they were rioting. By the time the case was heard at Hove Magistrates Court, Hutchings had been signed by the Albion for £50,000. We cannot confirm whether true Chelsea supporters such as messrs Attenborough, Ferrell, Ramsay, Sheeran, Goulding, Ritchie, Theron, Clarkson, Hudson, Allen, Ronson, Miller or Watson were involved.

Played for both
We’ve had a mixed bag with taking on former Chelsea youngsters who failed to make the grade at Stamford Bridge. Leon Knight, Liam Bridcutt and Rohan Ince could all be considered relative successes while Alexis Nicholas was not even if he did have a fantastic head of hair.

Dangermen
This section was going to be all about Alvaro Moratta given he is a centre forward that loves heading the ball and we can’t stop conceding from crosses. Rather helpfully, he managed to get himself sent off on Wednesday night in the Blue’s FA Cup Replay with Norwich City which means he is suspended here. The onus then falls on Eden Hazard who was superb in our 2-0 Boxing Day defeat at the Bridge while Gary Cahill probably fancies following in the footsteps of Steve Cook, Jonny Evans and Craig Dawson as a centre back to score against us from a corner.

Betting
Games against the top six have been remarkably consistent for winning money. e’ve lost every single one, not scored from open play and four of them have ended 2-0. Chelsea are priced at 8/13 to win (MyBettingSites). W We’re therefore backing Chelsea to win and under 2.5 goals, a Chelsea clean sheet and just like in the games with Manchester City, Manchester United and at the Bridge on Boxing Day, draw half time/Chelsea full time.

Prediction
Chelsea’s defence in the league has been rock solid in recent weeks and scoring goals remains a real problem for the Albion at the minute. Even without Moratta and Pedro, it is hard to escape the conclusion that Chelsea will have too much for us, so it is a 2-0 win to the Blues.