Business ready: Chelsea arrive at the Bank of America Stadium
Enzo Maresca’s side come into the knockout stages of the Club World Cup with a point to prove after a mixed group stage. The Blues won two of their three games in Group D, beating Esperance de Tunis and LAFC, but they were stunned by Flamengo, who capitalised on a poor performance to take a shock 3-1 victory.
Summer signing Liam Delap scored his first goal in west London blue against the Tunisian side last time out, as Maresca shuffled his pack slightly, expecting perhaps to face Bayern Munich in this round, rather than Benfica, who defeated Vincent Kompany’s Bundesliga champions 1-0.
Tonight should prove to be an entertaining game, with Bruno Lage’s team a tricky opponent at the Bank of America Stadium in Charlotte, North Carolina. Follow the Club World Cup last 16 action LIVE below with Standard Sport's dedicated match blog, with expert input from Chelsea reporter Dom Smith!
12 mins: Danger for Chelsea as Badiashile is sloppy on the ball, and is robbed on the edge of his own penalty area.
Pavlidis seizes upon the scraps, with the Greek striker looking to steamroller his way into the box, but Levi Colwill steps across to block his route to goal and reprieve his central defensive partner.
9 mins: A tactical observation from a Chelsea perspective. It looks to be a 3-2-5 shape in possession for the Blues, with James tucking in as an auxiliary third centre-back.
It means that Cucurella can push on higher up the left, while Neto maintains the width down the right. Palmer is moving more centrally, afforded the freedom of the left half-space to evade Benfica’s tight marking system.
5 mins: Offside! Aursnes and Di Maria are linking up nicely down the Benfica right, with the makeshift right-back underlapping effectively to double-team Cucurella.
The Spaniard is outnumbered in the channel as Di Maria looks to dink a ball into the path of his full-back, who had darted into the area. It seemed as though Aursnes might have a chance to take the ball down and strike or lay it off for someone else to have a crack, but the flag finally is raised against him.
4 mins: Neto off the right thus has Palmer on the left - something we haven’t seen too much of.
Fernandez is in the number 10 hole behind Delap, as Palmer is given a free role to maraud wherever he pleases.
Chelsea are looking for that clipped ball over the top for Delap, who is sitting on the shoulder of the last man.
In this scenario, it’s Silva, who just about gets a toe in after it seemed that the England striker had outmuscled him entering the box!
As for Bruno Lage’s side, it’s not quite the defensive five-back that we were expecting.
Natural midfielder Frederik Aursnes will energetically bomb up and down the right flank from full-back, looking to support Angel di Maria on the overlap as the Argentine cuts in onto his stronger left foot.
On the other flank, Samuel Dahl and Andreas Schjelderup complete a Scandinavian duo down the left, with Schjelderup, the Norwegian winger, a tricky customer on the ball. Reece James will need to stay tight to him.
In the engine room, there are some familiar faces that have previously been linked with moves to the Premier League. Florentino Luis is the reliable anchor man, breaking up play diligently and starting counter attacks with short, sharp passes, while Turkish international Orkun Kokcu is the playmaker, looking to play progressive, penetrative passes through the lines to pierce the Blues’ backline.
Leandro Barreiro is the workhorse; the ball-winner that will not give Chelsea’s midfielders any time to dally, looking to pinch the ball high up the pitch.
Evangelos Pavlidis leads the line, capable of having his back to goal and receiving Kokcu’s passes into feet with central defenders breathing down his neck, or peeling off the last defender and spinning in behind. He represents a real goal threat that Maresca and his men must be wary of.