Chelsea take on Southampton at Stamford Bridge on Sunday for what is arguably the best Premier League fixture of the day, knowing that the only thing left to play for this season is the Premier League title as they look to bounce back from their Champions League elimination to Paris Saint-Germain midweek.
Ronald Koeman’s Southampton meanwhile has been suffering from a lack of goals, scoring only once in their last six outings.
However the Saints do have the Premier Leagues best defensive record and will come to London looking to go home with at least a point, and may even fancy their chances of all three is they can take advantage of the way Chelsea defends set pieces.
Chelsea boss Jose Mourinho has a full squad to choose from with the only absentee being John Obi Mikel who is out with a knee injury.
The Blues also welcomes back Nemanja Matic after the midfielder served his two-match domestic ban.
Goalkeeper
Thibaut Courtois will remain between the posts for the home team despite letting in two goals midweek, but to his credit, he did provide a brilliant save which unfortunately led to a corner that produced one of the two goals.
Defence
Branislav Ivanovic will start at right-back a position he has made his own for the club while at left-back Cesar Azpilicueta will keep the starting spot ahead of Filipe Luis following his fine performance against the French champions.
Captain John Terry will start at centre-back along with Kurt Zouma who will replace Gary Cahill after the England international received some of the blame for PSG’s two goals.
Midfield
While Cesc Fabregas may have cooled off a bit since first arriving at Chelsea he still has the quality to be a game changer and will be looking to provide the pass that sinks Southampton.
Nemanja Matic will be a welcome return following his two-game domestic ban, and will look to provide support playing in front of the back-four.
Eden Hazard continues to be Chelsea’s most valuable player and will be the man to create the most problems for Southampton this afternoon.
Oscar will also start the game after being criticised in the sending off of Zlatan Ibrahimovic when he over reacted the severity of the four that led to the Swedes sending off, with his countryman Willian getting the nod over Juan Cuadrado for the start.
Attack
Up front once more will be the lone figure of Diego Costa, who despite not scoring in his last seven games will be given the start due to Mourinho’s lack of options up front, which points to a new striker being signed during the summer to compete with the Brazilian born Spaniard.
