Next Saturday, 27th of September 2014, Chelsea will measure forces with Aston Villa at Stamford Bridge for round six of the English Premier League on a match that the Blues need to win if they want to maintain their place at the top of the league table.

After a sloppy draw against Schalke 04 for the UEFA Champions League in the middle of the week, Chelsea lost their first two points on their visit to Etihad Stadium over the weekend. José Mourinho’s pragmatic game style almost granted him the win, but a late goal by Chelsea’s prodigal son Frank Lampard allowed the Citizens to snatch a draw when they were already reduced to ten men, after Zabaleta’s red card on the 66th minute.

Chelsea’s goal appeared culminating a fantastic quick attacking team play completed by the Schürrle in front of the net. A few minutes later, the Brazilian born Spanish international forward, Diego Costa, almost got the second one in but the post returned his shot.

On last weekend’s match, the Blues apparently abandoned the attacking style they had been imposing since the beginning of the new season and returned to that pragmatic style Mourinho fomented last term. Whether people like it or not, the Portuguese manager’s approach almost granted him the three points and proved that there is still room in football for those teams that use counter-attacks as a weapon to achieve their intents.

Next weekend, the Blues will have yet another tough test when they meet Aston Villa at Stamford Bridge but Mourinho won’t certainly make the Birmingham side’s life any easier.

Regarding Aston Villa, their impressive season start ended abruptly last weekend since they were surprised at home by Arsenal, losing the game by 3-0. Before the match, the Villans were the best defence in the league, with only one goal allowed, but they ended up conceding three in just ten minutes in their last match. In fact, Aston Villa’s overall performance was far from impressive and suddenly the ghosts from last season came back to haunt supporters at Villa Park.

Such a heavy defeat will surely be difficult to process and the Villans will need to be at their very best if they want to make something positive out of their visit to Stamford Bridge.

The last time both teams went head-on-head at London, the home side won by 2-1 thanks to a goal by Ivanovic and an own goal by Luna. The Blues are firm favourites for the next Saturday’s match, although they should not rest on their oars, as Aston Villa have already proved they can cause some major upsets this season.

Chelsea

Stats: W-3 L-0 D-2

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Aston Villa

Stats: W-2 L-2 D-1

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Possible Line-ups

Chelsea (4-3-3) – Courtois - Ivanovic - Terry - Cahill - Filipe Luis - Matic - Fàbregas - Hazard - Schurrle - Oscar - Diego Costa

Aston Villa (4-4-1-1) – Guzan - Hutton - Cissokho - Senderos - Clark - Richardson - Cleverley - Delph - Sanchez- Weimann - Agbonlahor

Prediction

Chelsea 2 Aston Villa 0