Enzo Maresca believes the trip to Southampton will be Chelsea's toughest game of the season so far and has warned his players they must be ready.
The head coach is well versed in how Russell Martin’s Saints will operate, having battled with them for promotion from the Championship last season while at Leicester City.
Southampton have only managed to pick up five points from their 13 matches thus far and currently sit at the foot of the table, but Maresca believes that is not representative of the performances they have showed.
Maresca said: ‘This is the worst game for us since we started the season. The toughest game and we need to be ready, otherwise it will be a bad day for us.
‘If you analyse the results, they are there \[at the bottom of the table\] but in terms of performances they are very good. They were leading against Liverpool, only lost 1-0 to Manchester City and they drew in the last game against Brighton.
‘I was in the Championship with Southampton last season and I know how good they are. They are very brave, they want to keep the ball and for sure this will be a very difficult game for us and we need to be ready.’
Chelsea kicked-off a busy period of fixtures throughout December on Sunday with a 3-0 win over Aston Villa and we sit third in the Premier League, level on points with second-placed Arsenal.
With a trip to London rival Tottenham Hotspur to come on Sunday and a total of seven matches to play between now and Boxing Day, Maresca was asked at his pre-match press conference whether he would consider rotating his players for tomorrow night’s meeting in Hampshire.
‘I don’t know yet,’ Maresca answered. ‘We had a session yesterday where the players who played on Sunday were in recovery and the rest of the guys trained as normal.
‘This afternoon we will have another session and then we will decide \[on who starts\] after then.'