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The prize on offer tonight is a quarter-final tie with Palmeiras in Philadelphia next Friday. Palmeiras won an epic stand-off with fellow Brazilians Botafogo earlier this afternoon; Rob Smyth tells that story in the time-honoured minute-by-minute style.
Chelsea make seven changes to the team that started the easy win over Espérance Tunis. Robert Sánchez, Marc Cucurella, Levi Colwill, Pedro Neto, Cole Palmer, Moisés Caicedo and captain Reece James are back; Filip Jörgensen, Tosin Adarabioyo, Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall, Josh Acheampong, Malo Gusto, Noni Madueke and Christopher Nkunku drop to the bench. Enzo Fernández, Roméo Lavia, Benoît Badiashile and Liam Delap are the only players to remain in the starting XI. There, that’s everyone mentioned.
Benfica make just two changes after their 1-0 win over Bayern Munich. Orkun Kökçü and Florentino replace Gianluca Prestianni and Renato Sanches, who drop to the bench. Their starting line-up includes a couple of Premier League old boys in the shape of Nicolas Otamendi and Angel Di Maria, once of Manchesters City and United respectively, while they’re managed by former Wolves boss Bruno Lage.
The teams
Benfica: Trubin, Aursnes, Dahl, Antonio Silva, Otamendi, Florentino, Barreiro, Kokcu, Pavlidis, Di Maria, Schjelderup.
Subs: Ferreira, Carreras, Bajrami, Wynder, Santos, Oliveira, Prioste, Rego, Veloso, Luis, Bruma, Belotti, Akturkoglu, Gouveia, Prestianni.
Chelsea: Sanchez, James, Cucurella, Badiashile, Colwill, Caicedo, Palmer, Lavia, Fernandez, Pedro Neto, Delap.
Subs: Slonina, Penders, Adarabioyo, Chalobah, Gusto, Sarr, Anselmino, Acheampong, Dewsbury-Hall, Essugo, Santos, Nkunku, Madueke, Guiu, George.
Referee: Slavko Vincic (Slovenia).
Preamble
If history is any guide, we might as well anoint Chelsea the winners of this tie right now and be done with it. The victors obvious. An early night. Let’s go to bed. Because not only do Chelsea have a 100-percent record against Benfica, three wins out of three, the most notable of which being this Rafa-infused banger in 2013 …
… but there’s the ghost of Béla Guttmann to consider as well. Benfica are famously doomed abroad, having denied their two-time winning European Cup manager a pay rise in 1962, forcing him to spit as he stormed out of the exit door: “Not in a hundred years from now will Benfica ever win a European Cup!” Oh Béla. Oh Benfica. They’ve played eight major European finals since, one of them being the aforementioned Benitez-flavoured failure, and lost the lot. This isn’t a club with the wind behind when it comes to tournaments like this.
But then, this is not Europe. So perhaps the Club World Cup is the perfect platform upon which to snap their miserable international run. And their tails will be up after beating Bayern Munich on Tuesday. Only problem is, upwardly mobile Chelsea are still high on life after their Conference League success, so will fancy their chances of making it four from four against the Eagles of Lisbon, one step closer to repeating their success in a tournament they first won just three years ago. Neither team is perfect, so this is set up nicely. Kick-off at the home of the Carolina Panthers is at 9pm UK time, 4pm local. It’s on! Keep pounding!
