Chelsea vs Flamengo – Team News: Summer signing makes full Chelsea debut | OneFootball

Chelsea face Flamengo in Philadelphia in the Club World Cup in just over an hour, and the teams are in!

Enzo Maresca, as he predicted in the pre-match presser, has made four changes to the team that beat LAFC on Monday night.

Trevoh Chalobah comes into defence to play alongside Levi Colwill. Malo Gusto plays on the right wing, replacing Noni Madueke. Enzo Fernandez returns to midfield with Romeo Lavia dropping out. Up front, Liam Delap makes his first start for the club in place of Nicolas Jackson.

Here are the full team line-ups for Chelsea vs Flamengo (kick off at 19:00 GMT)

CHELSEA:

Chelsea’s team to face Flamengo in the Club World Cup.

Maresca continues to frustrate a little with selections

While we didn’t expect more than the 4 or 5 changes Enzo Maresca predicted, this wasn’t really how we saw things going. We were sure that Moises Caicedo, who played so much last season, then played with Ecuador last week, then started on Monday night, would get a rest.

Instead he stays in, and Andrey Santos remains on the bench for a second game in a row. That’s annoying for Santos and the fans who want to see him rewarded for a superb 18 months on loan. It’s also playing with fire in terms of Caicedo, who is surely hurtling towards a serious muscle injury at this rate.

The lack of wingers in the squad is also exposed here, with full back Gusto appearing to play out wide. Jamie Gittens and Estevao Willian can’t arrive soon enough.

A word also for Marc Cucurella – the full back makes his 50th appearance since August for Chelsea alone, with no trusted left back cover to replace him. The decision to not bring Ishe Samuels-Smith and give him at least one start in this tournament remains a puzzling one.