Eintracht Frankfurt v Chelsea Betting Tips: Will Blues get the job done in Germany?

Likely XIs

Eintracht Frankfurt: Trapp; Ndicka, Hinteregger, Hasebe; Costa, Rode, Fernandes, Kostic; Gacinovic; Paciencia, Jovic.

Chelsea: Arrizabalaga; Azpilicueta, Christensen, Luiz, Alonso; Kante, Jorginho, Loftus-Cheek; Hazard, Giroud, Willian.

Eintracht Frankfurt will be without two of their three influential forward players for the first leg, though it’s expected they’ll all team up again in the away tie.

Sebastien Haller has missed their previous seven matches and is suffering from an abdominal strain, while Ante Rebic picked up a suspension for the first leg through an accumulation of yellow cards in this season’s competition.

The German side are also likely to be without Timothy Chandler, who has been suffering with knocks all season.

Chelsea are facing a defensive crisis and are down to only two first-team centre backs. David Luiz and Andreas Christensen are the only two that are fit, with Antonio Rudiger out for the remainder of the season after undergoing surgery on a knee injury, Gary Cahill suffering an Achilles tendon problem and Ethan Ampadu still out through a back injury.

They’ll also be without the influential Callum Hudson-Odoi. The young English winger has scored four Europa League goals this term, but he’s undergone surgery on a ruptured Achilles tendon and will not return to the pitch this campaign. Willian or Pedro will fill his void for this clash.

Key Battles

It’s a battle of the in-form strikers at the Commerzbank-Arena tonight, with Chelsea’s Olivier Giroud and Frankfurt’s Luka Jovic battling it out to become the competitions top scorer this season.

Giroud has bagged 10 goals already, with Jovic back on 8, but the young Serbian footballer has caught the eye of every top club this season for his goalscoring, and with good reason.

Eden Hazard is likely to once again be crucial to the Blues’ creativity. Frankfurt boss Adi Hutter hinted that he’d come up with a plan to stop the Belgian from having an impact by doubling up on the winger, after rating Hazard as ‘one of the top three players in the world.’

Jorginho has struggled to live up to the expectations of the Chelsea fans this season, but with the Italian midfielder still looking to make an impression, he could be a key figure here. Sebastian Rode and Gelson Fernandes are likely to be the two in the middle for Frankfurt that are tasked with shutting him down.

Match Odds

Chelsea come into the away tie as slight favourites to gain the first leg advantage at 6/4, but the West Londoners are overwhelming favourites to make it to the Baku showpiece at 4/9.

Eintracht will be looking to take advantage of Chelsea’s defensive frailties, and with Jovic up top, it could be a tough night for Luiz and Christensen. They’re 19/10 to win at home, with the Germans 13/8 outsiders to make it to the final.

Jovic is the outright favourite to break the deadlock in the game at 3/1, or you can get 23/20 on the Serbian wonderkid scoring anytime.

Giroud is only a couple of games away from bagging the Europa League golden boot, but he’ll want to add to his tally here. The Frenchman is 6/1 to score first, with 12/5 on a goal anytime for the Chelsea man.

Fancy Chelsea to grab a vital away goal? 21/20 says Both Teams to Score.

View the latest Eintracht Frankfurt v Chelsea odds at Coral.

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All Odds and Markets are correct as of the date of publishing.