Copenhagen v Chelsea: Back Danes to keep it close | OneFootball

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Chelsea need to find their direction again

The visitors might not put on a princely performance in Denmark today, says Tobias Gourlay

FC Copenhagen v ChelseaThursday 17:45 (Live on Discovery+)

In the Netherlands last night, Inter beat Feyenoord to give us an Under 2.5 Goals winner.

We're in Denmark today for the first leg of the Conference League Last 16 tie between Copenhagen and Chelsea.

The West London outfit cruised through the group stage of this competition, winning all six of their games despite Enzo Maresca resting his stars in this competition. Since the conclusion of the group stage, however, Maresca's men have stumbled.

Across all competitions, they have gone W4-D3-L6. Their away record since late December is W0-D2-L5, as they have scored only four times across those seven outings.

Copenhagen finished just W2-D2-L2 in the Conference League group stage (W1-D1-L1 at home) and were forced into a playoff. They squeezed past Heidenheim in extra time of the second leg, having lost the home leg 1-2.

Chelsea's quality makes them odds-on favourites to win at Parken Stadium tonight, but, with their confidence down from where it was, they are hard to trust at the prices.

Nicolas Jackson is set to miss this game and Cole Palmer has been struggling to produce without him: the England star is seven appearances without a goal. It remains to be seen whether Palmer starts his first Conference League game of the campaign today.

Despite their unremarkable campaign to this point, Copenhagen are capable of upsetting the Blues. Top of their domestic Superliga, the Danes beat Manchester United 4-3 in the Champions League here last season. They eventually went out of that competition to Manchester City in the Last 15, losing the home first leg of that tie 1-3.

Chelsea are not the fearsome prospect that City were back then. With the visitors struggling for goals, and potentially sending out an unfamiliar starting XI, we'll take a punt on the hosts, who have a track record of causing problems for bigger teams, to keep the tie in the balance tonight.

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