Chelsea x Crystal Palace – Preview, Prediction and Betting Tips 27/12/2023

Chelsea returns to the field in the Premier League this Wednesday, when they host Crystal Palace at Stamford Bridge.

This period of English football, where there are a series of games in a short space of time, ends up putting teams in somewhat interesting situations.

Chelsea

For Chelsea, for example, the fact of having a game in a row will be good, to erase the defeat they had last weekend.

Facing Wolverhampton, away from home, they were unable to combat the opponent’s game model, using low lines and abusing offensive transitions.

Chelsea had a lot of possession, but difficulty building. They lost 2-1 and at no point were they able to dominate their opponent to the point of turning the match around.

The team now has a campaign of 6 wins, 4 draws and 8 losses. With 22 points, they are in tenth place and are already 14 points below fifth place, Manchester City.

They need to win again, as they have 3 defeats in the last 4 games and are almost definitively out of the fight for a place in European leagues next season.

In addition to this defeat to Wolverhampton, in this negative period they also lost away from home to Everton and also as a visitor to Manchester United.

As a positive point, there is the fact that they are returning to play at home and at Stamford Bridge they have won 2 in a row, despite their poor campaign as home team.

The last time they played in front of their fans, they beat Brighton 3-2 and Sheffield United 2-0.

Crystal Palace

Crystal Palace, on the other hand, has a greater danger of relegation and currently occupies 15th place, with 18 points.

They are 3 places above the relegation group, with a 6 point advantage over Luton.

But the team is also in a terrible moment, as it has a streak of 7 games without victories. There were 4 defeats in this period, and the team now comes from 2 draws.

The first of them was much celebrated, finishing 2-2 away from home against the powerful Manchester City, but as home team in the last round, they were unable to beat Brighton, ending up one-on-one.

In fact, an interesting fact is that of these 7 games that they failed to win, in 6 of them both teams scored, and we believe that this could also be a trend against Chelsea.

Conclusion:

It is not a team that should propose to play with high lines, but just as Wolves caused Chelsea a lot of difficulty with this game model, I believe that Crystal Palace can also be competitive with this standard.

Given the size and theoretical quality that Chelsea has, the team will certainly always be favored, but I don’t believe it is a good betting option.

They could win this match, but their odds have no value and our betting option will be for both teams to score, which has been a pattern for Crystal Palace in these last games, and also predicting Chelsea’s usual difficulties.