For Liverpool, the remainder of this season is little more than a procession. But starting with Chelsea, the upcoming games still hold huge potential significance to the opponents, with Enzo Maresca making it clear where his priorities lie.
Assuming it follows tradition, Chelsea will be the first side to give Arne Slot’s men a guard of honor. But once any such pageantry is out of the way, the Blues are in major need of the three points in their quest to qualify for next season’s Champions League.
Chelsea is currently occupying the final such spot, following defeat for Nottingham Forest yesterday. But the gap to seventh is only three points, and dropping out of the top five would consign Maresca’s side to a third consecutive season outside of Europe’s elite competition.
That very real risk will surely give some of the players forming the guard of honor on Sunday some pause for thought. What might Moises Caicedo be thinking as he applauds Ryan Gravenberch and Wataru Endo onto the pitch?
There’s also Christopher Nkunku, whose agents have been putting out extremely optimistic feelers with sides including Liverpool. Romeo Lavia is another who will be wondering what might have been.
But Chelsea players will need to banish any such thoughts from their minds when they take on Liverpool. And even though Maresca appears to be closing in on a European trophy, it’s clear that he is prioritizing the league.
Chelsea played Djurgarden on Thursday night in the first-leg of the Europa Conference League semi-final. Despite the Blues having not won a trophy of any description since 2021, Maresca made eight changes to his line-up.
The likes of Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall, Tyrique George, Benoit Badiashile and Josh Acheampong all got rare starts. 16-year-old Reggie Walsh even ended up making it onto the pitch.
(Image: Linnea Rheborg – UEFA/UEFA via Getty Images)
In fairness, Maresca correctly judged his ability to rotate. Chelsea still romped to a 4-1 victory, albeit with goals coming from the more usual sources of Jadon Sancho, Noni Madueke and Nicolas Jackson.
Arne Slot spoke to the press ahead of the weekend’s fixture. He marvelled at Chelsea’s ability to rotate:
“I saw them taking all the players off at half time, so talking about quality! Semi-final in Europe, taking so many players off, and just bringing a bunch of new players in with the same quality,” Slot remarked.
“But that’s the Premier League, we all have that, we all have so much quality we can all do this. That’s why this league is so popular.”
Indeed, Liverpool may be doing some rotation of its own now that the league is wrapped up, and that doesn’t eqaute to an acceptance of defeat in the remaining games. Even so, the extent of Chelsea’s changes for the away leg against Djurgarden spoke volumes about the priorities at Stamford Bridge.
And it’s hard to blame Maresca. It’s something of a shame, but the financial disparity between winning the Conference League and returning to the Champions League is vast — if Chelsea could only pick one, then the winner is clear.
But rotated team or not, Liverpool will be looking to scupper the plan. It might now be playing for little more than added pride, but complicating Chelsea’s path back to the big time is a worthy goal in and of itself.
