Norwich City vs Chelsea – Preview, H2H, Line-ups, Prediction | EPL 2021-22

Thomas Tuchel-Chelsea

Chelsea will travel to Craven Cottage on Thursday to play Norwich City in the 30th round of the 2021/22 Premier League season. 

Venue: Craven Cottage

Key Statistics

Norwich are on a five-game winless run in the Premier League (D1, L4).

They are the league’s lowest scorers and own the second-worst defence in the PL too.

The Canaries are winless in 18 meetings against the visitors (D4, L14).

Chelsea have won their last three PL games.

They have kept three clean sheets in their last three games also. 

The Blues have now racked up a league-high 12 goals in the first 15 minutes after the break.

No team has turned more half-time draws into full-time victories away from home than Chelsea’s six this campaign.

Kai Havertz has scored the opening goal of the game in eight of his last 11 goal-scoring outings for Chelsea.

Head to head

Chelsea are utterly dominant in this fixture. They are unbeaten against Norwich in 18 meetings, winning 14 of those games. 

The ‘Blues’ were also able to prevent Norwich from scoring in 11 of those mentioned H2H fixtures, racking up 3+ goals themselves in nine of those meetings.

Latest performances in all competitions

Norwich: L-L-L-L-L

Chelsea: W-W-L-W-W

Norwich 

Norwich City will hope for a positive result when they welcome Chelsea to Carrow Road on Thursday night.

With the season coming to an inevitable close, the hosts are speedily running out of time to avoid the drop. And to stand a chance of doing so, they have to win all their remaining games and hope for a miracle. But first up in that regard is a home game against a Chelsea that handed them their heaviest league loss – a 7-0 defeat at Stamford Bridge in the reverse fixture. 

Dean Smith’s side are the worst team in all regards in the Premier League having lost more games and scored fewer goals than any other side in the League and on Thursday night. Only Leeds United (61) have conceded more goals than they have this season (58 goals).  

They come up against a team with the joint best defence in the League and a desire to remain in the top four.

Norwich are winless in their last six games in all competitions, also dropping out of the FA Cup against Liverpool. 

Since taking over in November last year, Dean Smith has not been able to stem the rot in the Norwich side and if fortunes are to remain the same, his side look certain to drop to the Championship.

Possible Norwich starting line-up

Tim Krul; Max Aarons, Grant Hanley, Ben Gibson, Brandon Williams; Kenny McLean, Billy Gilmour, Lees Melou; Joshua Sargent, Teemu Pukki, Milot Rashica.

Injured: Adam Idah, Andrew Omobamidele

Doubtful: Ozan Kabak

Suspended: None 

Chelsea

Chelsea travel to Carrow Road to take on Premier League bottom team Norwich City as the battle for the Premier League crown rages on.

Having been considered as a one-horse race with City roaring to the top and leading the race by a good gap, the title race was suddenly blown open when Pep Guardiola’s side lost at home to Tottenham. 

Chelsea, with two games in hand on Manchester City, find themselves presented with a slim chance to take advantage if Man City and Liverpool somehow stumble along the way.

Since taking over Chelsea last year, Thomas Tuchel has won all but a domestic trophy and recently crashed out of the EFL Cup dramatically and with the season fast approaching its end, the German tactician knows that his team can ill afford a loss, especially with Arsenal breathing down their necks and only six points separating them from Manchester United in fifth place.

With over ten games left to play for Chelsea, the possibility of dropping out of the top four remains slim and a win against a struggling Norwich side shouldn’t be a tough ask for a team that scored four past Burnley over the weekend.

Possible Chelsea starting line-up

Edouard Mendy; Thiago Silva, Antonio Rudiger, Malang Sarr; Reece James, N’golo Kante, Jorginho, Marcos Alonso; Mason Mount, Kai Havertz, Romelu Lukaku.

Injured: Ben Chilwell 

Doubtful: Cesar Azpilicueta

Suspended: None

Prediction

Norwich 0-3 Chelsea