Since the Premier League restart, Christian Pulisic has been Chelsea FC’s best overall player. Heading into Tuesday night’s clash at Crystal Palace, the young American is riding a streak of games in which he’s either scored, assisted or won a penalty setting up a spot kick score.
He’s really starting to fill the void left by Eden Hazard when the Belgian left for Real Madrid. During and after the 3-0 win over Watford on Fourth of July (the birthday of Pulisic’s home country), media pundits and social media users alike drew Pulisic-Hazard analogies.
It’s easy to see why this topic was brought up to both players shortly after both transfers had been completed.
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For the Blues, the top injury concern is definitely and obviously N’Golo Kante, who suffered a hamstring injury in the weekend winner over Watford. It is not known at this time the extent of the damage, but given the rapid turnaround, it’s hard to imagine him being risked here.
Midfielder Mateo Kovacic and defender Fikayo Tomori are nearing a return, but this game comes a little too closer for either one. The former sustained a knock in the midweek loss on Wednesday night while the latter is still battling the muscular injury that he suffered in training ahead of the restart.
As for Palace, they will be sans three defenders as Martin Kelly, Jeffrey Schlupp and James Tomkins all ruled out indefinitely due to injury. They did however, welcome Christian Benteke back into the side.
Chelsea FC at Crystal Palace FYIs
Kickoff: Tue July 7, 8pm, Selhurst Park
Chelsea Starting XI Prediction: go to this link
TV Channel/Live Stream: Sky Sports (UK), fuboTV (US)
Referee: David Coote
Form Guide: Chelsea WLWWW Crystal Palace WWWLL
Position: Chelsea are fourth, up two points on surging Manchester United, one point behind Leicester City. Crystal Palace are 14th, well established in safety position.
Prediction: Chelsea 2, Crystal Palace 1
Paul M. Banks runs The Sports Bank.net, which is partnered with News Now. Banks, the author of “No, I Can’t Get You Free Tickets: Lessons Learned From a Life in the Sports Media Industry,” regularly contributes to WGN TV, Sports Illustrated, Chicago Now and SB Nation.
You can follow Banks, a former writer for Chicago Tribune.com, on Twitter and his cat on Instagram.
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