Chelsea: Stamford Bridge factor could be key in race for Champions League | OneFootball

Home form set to be crucial during run-in... as fans plan protest before Southampton clash

Ambition: Enzo Maresca has set his sights on Chelsea winning all seven remaining home games this season

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Your matchday briefing on Chelsea, featuring team news and expert analysis from Malik Ouzia

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On Friday last week, Enzo Maresca suggested that seven wins from Chelsea’s seven remaining home matches could be enough to deliver Champions League football. Judging by their recent away record, it might just have to be.

The Blues return to Stamford Bridge on Tuesday for their first home fixture in more than three weeks, with the visit of Championship-bound Southampton looking kind in its timing, to say the least.

In the Premier League, at least, it is not immediately obvious where the next one is coming from. Should Maresca’s men fail to beat Arsenal at the Emirates in the middle of next month, they will head into April still in the midst of that drought.

Slump: Cole Palmer in training ahead of Wednesday’s home game against rock-bottom Southampton

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From there, Chelsea’s four remaining away matches are west London derbies against Brentford and Fulham, followed by trips to Newcastle and Nottingham Forest that could have huge consequence in the race for the top four.

By contrast, the home leg of the home stretch offers a notably generous run. Bar the visit of Liverpool in early May (which, even from this far out, has the potential to be coronation day), all of Chelsea’s remaining fixtures are against teams in the bottom half, including each of the bottom three.

Win all seven, as Maresca set his sights on last week, and Chelsea will finish on a minimum of 64 points. Aston Villa finished fourth last season on 68 and such is the congested nature of the table that even fewer may be enough this season, particularly with English clubs well on track to claim a fifth Champions League spot. Chelsea can have a direct say in that by virtue of their own progress in the Conference League.

Yet if Maresca is right, and Chelsea’s home form is to be the defining factor in the final third of their campaign, then it cannot be ideal that they begin that run on Tuesday evening with a protest against the club ownership planned outside Stamford Bridge. Among various grievances is the decline in atmosphere at the ground.

“The only thing I can say is that every time the fans have been behind us, we really appreciate it because we are sure with the fans behind, we can achieve our target,” Maresca said, when asked about the protest last week.

A return to home comforts will be welcome for Chelsea and so, too, a fixture list for the run-in that skews favourably one way

Since losing to Manchester City on the opening day of the season, Chelsea have been beaten only once in 17 home games in all competitions and in a dismal run of form more broadly (nine points from 10 league games since mid-December), it has perhaps been lost that their recent home record has remained strong. They have won four of their last six league games on their own patch, but by a quirk of the fixture list have played nine of their last 15 away.

A return to home comforts, then will be welcome and so, too, a fixture list for the run-in that skews favourably one way, with Maresca convinced that victory on Tuesday night will spark his team back to life.

“If you remember; the first four or five away games at the start of the season, we won all of them and our best moments were away,” Maresca said following Saturday night’s 2-1 loss at Aston Villa. “It is football. During the season, it can happen that you win games at home and lose away.

"We have 12 games to go my feeling is that winning one, we will go again."