Chelsea vs Villa: The Odds

Chelsea face a trip to the Midlands to take on Aston Villa and look a solid bet at 1.91 with Betfred to come away with all three points.

The Blues lacked a cutting edge in their goalless draw against Spurs last weekend, but they’ve won all six of their other games since Roberto Di Matteo took the reins and put in a solid performance in their midweek 1-0 Champions League win at Benfica.

They currently sit five points off the top four with just eight games to go, so they can’t afford any slips ups against a side who have have all sorts of problems.

A host of injuries has left Alex McLeish with a real headache, and Charles N’Zogbia and Alan Hutton have now joined the likes of Richard Dunne, Darren Bent and Ciaran Clark on the sidelines.

The lack of key players has resulted in a poor run of results, and although they did manage to win their last game at home against Fulham it is their only victory in the last 8 games.

An on-song Chelsea will surely prove too much to handle, despite the stats suggesting that the Villans could be tough nuts to crack.

Chelsea have have actually only won one of their last 12 Premier League visits to Villa Park (W1 D7 L4), and have also scored just twice in their last 5 visits.

But I think that the stats can be cast aside for this one, as the form book points clearly to Chelsea at a time when villa are severely understrength.

Didier Drogba has scored in each of his last four appearances in all competitions against Villa, and he looks worth a punt at 5.5 with bet365 and Betfred to score first.

However even better value surely has to be the 2.3 on offer with bet365 for him to net anytime, and that’s where my cash will be going.

Chelsea to win 2-0 is my idea of the outcome and that is 8.5 chance with Paddy Power.