Chelsea made their return to the top tier of European football in fine fashion as Antonio Conte’s blew away Azerbaijani team Qarabag FK by a scoreline of 6-0.
Here are some of the major talking points from Chelsea’s win over Qarabag FK:
1) Great bench strength
What was all that about no decent depth in the squad? Chelsea started the game without Hazard, Rudiger, Morata, Bakayoko, Luiz, and Moses and were still extremely dominant from the start.
The squad has some excellent depth now and Chelsea should feel confident to do well atleast until January.
2) Conte masterclass
The Italian to his credit is great at developing players to their full potential. While the likes of Guardiola and co try to get the best players and gel them together, Conte brings average players to perform at their highest potential. He showed that with the improvement of Alonso, Luiz, and Moses last season and the likes of Zappacosta and Christensen seem to be on a similar path already this season.
3) Big goal for Batshuayi
Chelsea’s late move for Fernando Llorente meant that the manager still did not trust the Belgian completely even after his late heroics last season.
The former Marseille striker had a below par game and it seemed like he was trying too hard. However, the late goal will do a whole load of good for his confidence as he attempts to win Conte’s trust.
4) Pedro – Willian conundrum
With Hazard’s return from injury, it is irresistible to keep him away from the starting XI any longer. Such were the performances of Pedro and Willian on the night that it may seem harsh to drop either of them for Hazard. It is a great situation for the manager as he can look to call upon two good players whenever needed.
5) Minnows causing a waste of time in the Champions League
This may sound a bit too harsh but there is now way teams like Qarabag are going to threaten any of the teams from the top 5 European Leagues.
Clubs get involved in extreme fixture congestion which involves a lot of travelling to countries on the periphery of Europe and it affects the players adversely.
For a long time, there has been a debate as to whether only the clubs from top Leagues of Europe should compete in such a competition and it does not seem as wrong to do so now.
