Chelsea’s Double Gameweek 33 started in inglorious fashion as they were defeated 1-0 by Manchester United.
It’s a fourth successive Premier League defeat to nil for the Blues, who have gone over six hours without scoring.
Here are our Scout Notes from Saturday’s match.
ENZO, PEDRO + ESTAVAO INJURY WORRIES – MORE UPDATES TO COME TODAY
The Gameweek 33 disappointment started before a ball was kicked in Saturday’s late game. Upon the release of the teamsheets, Joao Pedro‘s (£7.7m) name was nowhere to be seen.
A minor thigh issue put paid to his involvement but there is optimism he could be back for Tuesday.
“Yeah, hopefully Joao will be fit and ready for Tuesday. Yeah, it would be great to have him back. We need him.” – Liam Rosenior on Joao Pedro
The injury blows kept on coming, with first Estevao (£6.4m) and then Enzo Fernandez (£6.5m) hobbling off. The former’s issue sounds more serious.
“I just saw him in the dressing room. I think it was his calf. I feel, I’m hoping it’s cramp. He’s getting work on it right now because we want him obviously fit for Tuesday.
“He ran himself into the ground for the club tonight and I expect nothing different from a man of his stature and his quality.” – Liam Rosenior on Enzo Fernandez
“Yeah, he was devastated. He was crying at half-time. Really devastated for him. It looks like it’s his hamstring.” – Liam Rosenior on Estevao
We won’t have to wait long for more updates, at least. Liam Rosenior is due to speak to the media on Tuesday at 1.30pm BST, so he’ll hopefully offer a bit more then.
You can follow the live updates from Chelsea and Brighton’s pressers here.
ENZO DEEPER, BUT…
Enzo’s much-anticipated return to the Chelsea XI saw him take up a deeper central role, rather than the ’10’.
Indeed, as the game progressed and frustrations mounted, he was almost alongside the centre-halves when receiving the ball, attempting to start the Blues’ attacks from way back.
It didn’t stop him from racking up three shots and five chances created, however.
Deep he may have been for the most part, but he did ghost into the box to fire Chelsea’s best chance of the game inches wide.
Only Pedro Neto (£7.0m) could better his xGI figure:
Enzo was at least more effective than many of his teammates. Cole Palmer (£10.5m) was sub-par, with very little coming off. The stats column may say four shots but three of them were blocked at source outside of the box.
Liam Delap (£6.2m) also toiled in attack, with Pedro’s presence a big miss.
ONE SHOT IN THE BOX, ONE GOAL
Chelsea were pretty poor on Saturday but many a team has played worse than this in 2025/26 and come away with results.
For starters, the Blues hit the woodwork three times. An Estevao shot clipped the outside of the post before Delap and, unwittingly, United’s own Noussar Mazraoui (£4.9m) struck the underside of Senne Lammens‘ (£5.1m) bar.
Rosenior can (and did) also point to the fact that United’s goal only came when Chelsea were temporarily down to 10 men due to injury.
In fact, that was the Red Devils’ only shot in the box of the game!
“They’ve had one shot on our goal, when we’re down to 10 men off an injury, and score. And then we have wave after wave of attack, crosses in the box, moments that we don’t take advantage of. I think we’ve hit the woodwork four or five times.” – Liam Rosenior
Still, there’s a malaise around Chelsea at present, and with a top-five spot (i.e. UEFA Champions League qualification) now looking out of reach, you’d question their motivation for the run-in.
MBEUMO LIMPING + £3.7M HEAVEN HOLDS STRONG
United will savour the result rather than the performance.
Then again, they didn’t have to come out and attack once they were 1-0 up.
Their meagre tally of four shots and 0.21 xG (Statsbomb) also doesn’t quite tell the full story, as several breaks away were just missing a finishing touch. Matheus Cunha (£8.0m) would have had a great scoring chance had he controlled Bryan Mbeumo‘s (£8.5m) 25th-minute pass, only for the ball to bobble away from him. Even Bruno Fernandes (£10.3m) was culpable on occasion, although he did nearly get lucky with one errant pass that almost deflected past Robert Sanchez (£4.8m).
No surprise, however, that Bruno was the architect of three of United’s four shots, including the assist for Cunha’s winner.
We’ll have to keep an ear out for any update on Mbeumo later in the week, as he seemed to be limping when he came off late on. There were no quotes from Michael Carrick on him after the match.
At the rear, all credit to the makeshift centre-half pairing of Mazraoui and Ayden Heaven (£3.7m). It wasn’t always convincing, but a clean sheet was no less admirable in the circumstances.
Harry Maguire (£4.4m) of course now returns from a ban, so that centre-half partnership will likely be a short-lived one – although one of Mazraoui/Heaven may be needed if Leny Yoro (£4.1m) misses out again.
“Hopefully it’s only [a] small [issue] but he’s obviously not ready for tonight.” – Michael Carrick on Leny Yoro, speaking ahead of kick-off
