Things have certainly changed for the Blues over the last couple of weeks. At the beginning of the month they were sitting pretty at the top of the EPL and boasted the best defense in the league with just six goals let in. However, they now find themselves in third place with 36 points after just one loss against West Ham and have now let in a total of 11 goals this season. It just goes to show that there is little margin for error at the top of the EPL table and that the Blues need every available point to make sure Manchester City and Liverpool both remain within reach. Up until the beginning of the month the Blues looked unstoppable but their loss against West Ham seems to have shaken up their confidence a bit, at least on the defensive front. Tuchel’s men have let in more goals in their last three competitive matches than what they have let in in the EPL up until the month of December. This is very worrying for the Blues and definitely something that needs to be sorted before their campaign will be back on track. I would still consider their attack to be doing everything that needs to be done, but they will only be making things easier on themselves if they tighten up their defense and avoid close calls like they had against Leeds last Saturday. If they can put in a big defensive effort against an Everton team that’s averaging less than a goal per match in their last five matches, then it will take some pressure off of their attack and restore some confidence amongst the fans.

There was a glimmer of hope for the Toffees after they pulled off a well-deserved win against Arsenal at Goodison Park just under two weeks ago. However, any hopes of a turnaround for the club were quickly dashed a week later when they crashed to a 3-1 defeat against Crystal Palace. Benitez’s men now find themselves all the way down in 14th place on the table with 18 points and slipping closer and closer towards the relegation zone each week. Everton have only managed to pick up five wins this entire season and have only won one of their last five matches. This is largely due to a poor defensive effort throughout the season that has seen them concede 28 goals which is the fourth-worst in the league. Twelve of those goals alone came in their last five matches and until they can plug the holes in their defense they will not move any higher on the table and have a good chance of ending up in the relegation zone in the near future.  With just four goals in their last five matches goal-scoring has been far from ideal and it’s not going to get any easier on Thursday night when they take on the team with the second-best defense in the league. It will certainly count in their favour that the Blues have been conceding goals as of late, but even if they manage to sneak a couple into the home net they still have the Chelsea attack to tame which will be no easy task.

Surprisingly Everton leads the head-to-head between the teams in the last five EPL clashes. The Toffees have won three, while Chelsea have won two. All of Everton’s recent victories came at Goodison Park and all of Chelsea’s recent victories came at Stamford Bridge. The Blues are unbeaten in their last 26 EPL matches at Stamford Bridge against Everton and if they avoid defeat on Thursday they could match their longest ever unbeaten run against any opponent in league history.

Prediction

For me the question is not who will win, but rather by how many goals will Chelsea win? Everton proved on the weekend that their season is not yet ready to improve with their loss against Palace and when you add in the fact that Everton haven’t been able to win at Stamford Bridge in over 30 years it’s pretty much impossible to back the away team in this match. Everton have managed to keep things relatively close in the majority of their matches with Chelsea though and five out of their last seven EPL matches have seen fewer than 2.5 goals. However, I am not too confident that under 2.5 goals would land considering how good Chelsea’s attack can be so I would rather go with Chelsea to win by a margin of 2-3 goals. I don’t believe the Toffees will be able to score in this match so I am also happy to back only one team to score and Chelsea to win, while my goalscorer selection has to be Mason Mount. The youngster is in red-hot form right now and has scored in Chelsea’s last three EPL matches and it’s definitely worth backing him to extend his streak to four.

BetOlimp Best Bets

Winning Margin: Chelsea by 2-3 goals: yes – 2.25
Victory and Both to Score: no and Chelsea – 1.70
Anytime Goalscorer: Mason Mount – 2.11