Premier League: Can High-Flying Bees Sting Leaders Chelsea?

Brentford vs Chelsea

Who would’ve thought heading into this Premier League season that the Brentford-Chelsea London derby on Matchday 8 would be a battle between the capital’s top two clubs?

But that is indeed the case, as newly promoted Brentford have had a blistering start to the season and are currently up in seventh spot.

The brave Bees pushed Liverpool hard when they hosted the Reds at the Community Stadium, and they will now look to do the same when league leaders Chelsea come to visit this weekend.

The Blues – who looked far from their best before the international break – will be a bit banged up due to injuries and other absences, but the Premier League 2021 betting odds still have them favoured to get past the Bees.

Talking Points

Brentford still buzzing

Brentford have had a simply brilliant start to their first-ever Premier League season. The new boys went into the international break on the back of three impressive Premier League 2021 results – a 2-0 away win against Wolves, a thrilling 3-3 draw against Liverpool, and a 2-1 away win at West Ham – that have seen them rise to seventh in the table.

Yoane Wissa was the hero in the last two matches as he came up with two clutch goals. The Frenchman came on late to score the equaliser against Liverpool, then got the dramatic stoppage-time winner at West Ham.

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Those goals are a testament to Brentford coach Thomas Frank’s fearless philosophy to keep pushing until the very end.

Frank has fielded a mostly settled starting lineup to start the season, but he could be forced to give Wissa his first career Premier League start amid Brentford’s injury concerns.

Midfielders Shandon Baptiste and Vitaly Janelt are both carrying injuries and could potentially miss out. Centre-back Kristoffer Ajer, who missed the West Ham match with a hamstring injury, is also a doubt.

Luckily, there are no such injury concerns surrounding the front two of Ivan Toney and Bryan Mbuemo. The two forwards have been excellent to start the season and have already combined for four goals and two assists.

Chelsea keen to get completely back on track

The international break came at a decent time for Chelsea. Thomas Tuchel’s men had been putting together a string of unimpressive performances, which culminated in disappointing 1-0 defeats at home to title rivals Manchester City and away to Juventus in the Champions League.

The Blues bounced back to beat Southampton 3-1 just before the break. But even then, they needed two late goals from Timo Werner and Ben Chilwell after Saints went down to 10 men due to James Ward-Prowse’s red card.

Thomas Tuchel will need a redemption win against Brentford after a series of unimpressive Premier League performances — Thomas Tuchel coaches Chelsea from the sidelines during their match against Southampton at Stamford Bridge

Unfortunately for Tuchel, he will not have his full complement of players at Brentford. Thiago Silva won’t make it back in time after Brazil’s World Cup qualifying match against Uruguay, while Romelu Lukaku and Antonio Rudiger are doubts to play after returning from international duty.

Meanwhile, it remains to be seen whether N’Golo Kante and Reece James can finally return. Kante is back in training after his Covid isolation, while James is working his way back to full fitness after his injury layoff.

The Blues do have the depth to cope with those potential absences. Centre-back Trevoh Chalobah has been brilliant this season and already has two goals to his name. Ruben Loftus-Cheek, who assisted Chalobah’s opener against Southampton, is staking his claim for more minutes, as is Ben Chilwell, who has two goals in his last two games for club and country.

Meanwhile, the much-maligned Timo Werner is also showing some decent goalscoring form. He has two goals in his last three games for Chelsea and bagged a brace for Germany against North Macedonia.

History

This will be just the 15th meeting all-time between Brentford and Chelsea and the first in the league since 1947, which Chelsea won. The Blues hold an 8-4 edge in wins, with two draws. Brentford’s last win over their London rivals came back in 1939 – 82 years ago.

The last four meetings between the two sides have come in the FA Cup – with three coming inside the last decade. Brentford held Chelsea to a 2-2 draw at home in 2013 but lost the replay at Stamford Bridge 4-0. That was also the result when they met again in 2017.

Betting Tip

	Brentford vs Chelsea	1X2 Draw @ 3.70
	October 17, 00:30 (GMT+8)

Despite Chelsea’s unconvincing form of late and Brentford’s impressive start, SBOTOP odds still have the Blues installed as massive 1.58 favourites, with the Bees priced at 6.00. A draw is at 3.70.

Clearly, though, Chelsea have some issues to iron out at the moment. The possible absence of Lukaku would be a huge loss, and most of the squad will be a bit fatigued after going on international duty.

Meanwhile, Brentford will be relatively fresh and will have had ample time to prepare for the threat Chelsea pose, so it will not be easy to beat them.

So much like the Liverpool match, I expect Brentford to push Chelsea to their limits at home and pick up a valuable point against another title contender.