If for plenty of Chelsea players the international break served as a welcome break and an opportunity to take stock, it is to be the last they get this side of Christmas.
Chelsea face a busy festive period, with Saturday’s trip to Burnley the first of nine games in just 29 days.
Burnley sit fourth bottom in the Premier League and have shipped more goals than every team bar West Ham and Wolves.
Here is a great opportunity for Chelsea to claim another three points and build on their position of third in the table, behind only Arsenal and Manchester City. Burnley have kept just two clean-sheets all season and can clearly be got at.
Perhaps even more important, though, is what lurks around the corner.
Pivotal matches arrive next week for Enzo Maresca and his young squad: a blockbuster Champions League tie against Barcelona on Tuesday and then a crucial league clash with Arsenal the following Sunday, both matches at Stamford Bridge.
It is paramount that Maresca’s players are fit and firing for those games, which could have huge implications for how both their European and domestic campaigns play out from here.
Chelsea’s defence needs to be in a robust mood heading into Barca and Arsenal, and their attacking players firing and brimming with confidence, too. Victory at Burnley, to keep up the momentum taken into the international break in the form of the 3-0 win over Wolves, would go a long way to making sure of that.
Maresca is presented with a handful of intriguing selection headaches, including whether to hand 18-year-old Estevao his first Premier League start since September following goalscoring form in the Champions League, a telling impact off the bench against Wolves and his fourth and fifth international goals for Brazil.
Whether to use Reece James or Malo Gusto at right-back is an evergreen question for Maresca given the need to constantly manage James’s workload, and Liam Delap’s availability since recovering from injury leaves the option to again start Delap and push Joao Pedro back to the No10 position.
Whatever Maresca decides, he cannot rest too many of Chelsea's best players against Burnley. Fitness ahead of Barcelona and Arsenal is vital, sure, but so too is form.
Chelsea’s first trip to Turf Moor since Raheem Sterling and Nicolas Jackson were among their scorers in a 4-1 win in October 2023 serves as an audition for two seismic games that will reveal plenty about how good Maresca’s team really are.
