Chelsea play West Brom at home in their second match of the EPL season and will look to ensure that they can get going with their first win in the competition. Chelsea had started off with a drawn game against the Stoke City and with both Manchester United and Manchester City having won the first game they had played, the Blues will look to get going as well.
While Chelsea had been held to a goalless draw by Stoke City, West Brom had gone down to Manchester United through a late goal at The Hawthorns.
It was interesting to note that Andre Villas-Boas started his EPL career with a draw, but more importantly, the side had gone into the game without Didier Drogba and Nicola Anelka. Already under pressure from their performances from the previous season, their ousters in that first game would lead to some more rumour-mongering and so, it would be interesting to see whether Chelsea play either of them in this game.
18-year old forward Romelu Lukaku has been signed up for the rest of the season, though, he may not get a game so soon. Goalkeeper Petr Cech, on the other hand, misses out while the eyes will be on Fernando Torres, whose form has been a cause for a lot of concern to the Blues fans.
Credit must be given to the Bagpipes for the way they performed in the first game, pluckily holding the Manchester United to 1-1 till the 83rd minute when the defending champions went up. Shane Long marked his debut with the lone goal for the Bagpipes in the match and will be the player to watch out for them in this encounter.
Manager Roy Hodgson will hope for the captain Chris Brunt to perform as well as he had in the Manchester United match. The goal-keeping duties will be performed by Ben Foster, who had earlier played for United and he will hope to continue with his good form too.
That said, it will not be easy for West Bromwich in front of the Chelsea fans. The Blues may not be in the best of their forms, but the simple fact of the matter is that they have won all their games against West Bromwich and a draw will be the best result they can expect out of the game.
A Chelsea win looks most likely, 1.3 to defeat West Bromwich, who are 13.5 to come out with an unlikely three points from the game. a draw is tipped to be at 5.7.