All you need to know: Southampton vs Chelsea | News | Official site

Having faced Leicester City 13 days ago at the King Power Stadium – where our victory was more comfortable than the 2-1 scoreline suggests – we host tonight another of the sides promoted to the top flight ahead of this season.

The match on the south coast kicks off at 7.30pm and, like all Premier League matches in this round, will be streamed live in the UK on Prime Video.

Promisingly for the Blues and Enzo Maresca, we have a good record against newly promoted clubs with eight wins from our 13 away games against top-flight newcomers since the start of the 2020/21 season. Only one of these matches ended in defeat.

Russell Martin’s side have the advantage of their draw against Brighton taking place last Friday, giving them two more days than the Blues to recover and prepare for tonight’s encounter.

In their last outing at St Mary’s, Southampton ran leaders Liverpool hard before succumbing to a 3-2 defeat. That result meant the league’s bottom club have won just one of their six home league games so far.

The south coast’s top contingent, the others being Brighton and Bournemouth, make up three of Chelsea’s five most prolific away sides, although the Saints won both of our meetings in their most recent relegation season.

Sunday’s impressive win over Aston Villa strengthened the Blues’ top-four claim, but Maresca has played down talk of a title challenge. That said, a win on the banks of the Itchen would put Chelsea in second place if Arsenal drop points against Manchester United in north London on the same evening.

Chelsea team news

Maresca’s ability to conjure up the squad will be tested by three Premier League games in eight days – so far he has switched sides for various midweek and weekend competitions.

The Italian’s tactical versatility was evident in our comprehensive 3-0 win on Sunday, with Aston Villa’s players marking man-to-man and Moises Caicedo turning into midfield from right-back.

The selection of Romeo Lavia, who joined the Blues from Southampton in the summer of 2023, helped free up captain Enzo Fernandez, whose attacking numbers have soared with goals in consecutive league games plus five assists across all fronts since November.

Villa were swamped by Chelsea’s energy and organisation, and the Blues have now been dispossessed fewer times (104) than any other top-flight side.

Tonight’s starting XI must be considered alongside our busy December schedule which includes a trip to Tottenham Hotspur on Sunday.

Wesley Fofana is set for a spell on the sidelines after coming off with a hamstring injury against Villa, and Maresca will have to decide which of Axel Disasi, Tosin Adarabioyo and Benoit Badiashile will step into the team – unless there is another surprise.

After Sunday’s win, Maresca said the vision and creativity of Cole Palmer and Joao Felix is ​​why people are buying tickets. Whether he chooses to deploy the duo in tandem remains to be seen.

Likewise, leading scorer in all competitions Christopher Nkunku could be an option to come in for Nicolas Jackson, who has registered the most runs (571) in the league this season but has opened the scoring six times for the Blues this term.

Combined goals and assists 2024/25 (all competitions)

Chelsea v Southampton – the story

This league match was first played at The Dell on 4 October 1924, so its 100th anniversary was two months ago.

The goalless Division Two encounter was largely without character, apart from a stunning save by Chelsea keeper Ben Howard Baker, who used his world-record diving skills to push away a shot on target.

Six decades later, in March 1986, a free-kick scored by skipper Colin Pates and brilliantly devised by Pat Nevin was enough to secure the points on the south coast and edge John Hollins’ side into fourth place.

The game is more famous for coming the day before our 5-4 Full Members’ Cup final win over Manchester City at Wembley, meaning the Londoners played over back-to-back days – with ten of the same starting XI.

Even more notable was the Boxing Day encounter 25 years ago, a 2-1 Blues win at The Dell, when Chelsea became the first Premier League club to field a starting XI made up entirely of overseas players.

Frustratingly, in the 2022/23 campaign, which saw them relegated from the top flight, Saints beat the Blues home and away. That included our first defeat at their place since 2013 – a 2-1 defeat in which Lavia canceled out Raheem Sterling’s opener.

The Blues’ record win against the Saints came the season before, in April 2022 under Thomas Tuchel, a 6-0 victory with Marcos Alonso opening the floodgates in the eighth minute. Mason Mount and Timo Werner both doubled and Kai Havertz also helped himself to a goal – all before the 55th minute.

Know this…

This is Chelsea’s 50th league visit to Southampton. Our league win percentage at Southampton is 44.9% – our fifth best against current Premier League clubs behind Bournemouth (55.6%), Palace (59.3%), Fulham (61.5%) and Brighton (66.7%) .

The Blues have won more Premier League games at Southampton (14) than anywhere else except Tottenham (15).

Chelsea have used 28 outfield players across all competitions and 17 of them have contributed to our goals or assists.

Cole Palmer has scored his first 30 Premier League goals for us in just 46 games – only Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink (41) was quicker.

Levi Colwill has made 973 passes so far in this season’s top flight, trailing only Virgil van Dijk (1050) and ahead of Saints pair Jan Bednarek (948) and Taylor Harwood-Bellis (900).

Chelsea have an identical league record to Arsenal and are third on alphabetical order alone. Any of the Gunners’ previous names – Royal Arsenal, Woolwich Arsenal, even Dial Square – would have had us in second place.

West London-born former sailor George Thomas, the builder and owner of Southampton’s old Dell stadium, was also a founder of Chelsea in 1905.

Nicolas Jackson and Pedro Neto have received four Premier League yellow cards and must avoid another through Matchweek 19 at the end of December to avoid a statutory ban.

Chelsea will discover our three group stage opponents for next summer’s FIFA Club World Cup on Thursday. The draw in Miami, USA, starts at 18:00 UK time.