Chelsea maintained their title tilt with a 3-1 seaside win over Blackpool, with Frank Lampard rewarding gameweek investment with a Fantasy return of bygone days.
While Lampard is back in the groove, Carlo Ancelotti was again left straw clutching as he attempted to talk up the marriage of Didier Drogba and Fernando Torres up front – a pairing that appears to be more effective at troubling each other than it does opposing defences.
Ancelotti started with the Drogba/Torres partnership in a 4-4-2 for the first time, dropping Nicolas Anelka to his bench. Elsewhere David Luiz overcame a slight hamstring strain to take his place in a Chelsea defence that saw a return for Jose Bosingwa at right-back with Branislav Ivanovic making way. In midfield, Yury Zhikov made his first start since November as Ancelotti opted to bench Florent Malouda.
There was plenty of shuffling in the Chelsea lineup then and the inclusion of Bosingwa and Zhirkov emphasises the options now available to Ancelotti – a concern for Fantasy Managers who can no longer find security amongst several former favourites.
The striker situation is clearly not settled. Chelsea looked far more effective when Salomon Kalou was introduced for Didier Drogba – until that point, his partnership with Torres had faltered and had failed to trouble the Blackpool defence. Typically Ancelotti was quick to defend his strikers, and particularly £50 million Torres, in his post-match analysis.
“[Fernando] is showing good movement, showed good movement with Drogba in the first half. It is important he works for the team and he is, he will improve and he will score obviously. I think they played well with good combinations at the start of the game. I didn’t ask them to play close, they spread the defence and they played well I think.”
Torres has now gone five consecutive Premier League matches without scoring for the third time this season. The Spaniard is clearly struggling for confidence but Ancelotti’s looks set to keep him in his starting lineup, rortating Drogba and Anelka around him. Considering the price tag paid, that’s not entirely surprising.
Drogba’s injury is difficult to assess, although with Chelsea’s next league encounter with City failing on March 20, it seems unlikely to be a concern in Fantasy terms. Ancelotti had this to say on the situation…
“Didier had a knock, we hope in two or three days he will be okay, we have to check in the next few days and after that we will know what happened…I don’t know the injury because I didn’t speak with the doctor.”
Lampard has now struck 4 goals in his last 5 league starts with 7 Bonus Points and 2 assists also dropping into that spell. That’s the kind of form we could associate with Lampard from previous seasons, but this recent spell is the first time this term he’s begun to display such returns. This upturn in Lampard’s output coincides with a run of kind opponents for Chelsea (MCY stk WIG wba BIR WHM) and, given the uncertainty up front, he looks a strong option for those looking to cover the attacking potential of Carlo Ancelotti’s side.
The Chelsea defence has kept just a single clean sheet in its last five league matches – away at Fulham in gameweek 27. That’s a sobering statistic for those looking to jump on the David Luiz bandwagon. The Brazilian was certainly exposed a few times by Blackpool’s propensity to run the Blues defence. Given Chelsea’s forthcoming opponents however, investment in Luiz would seem likely to pick up in the coming weeks.
