Chelsea will be hoping to get back to winning ways this weekend as they host Leeds United at Stamford Bridge.
The Blues go into the game off the back of an extremely difficult week after letting leads slip in both the Premier League and the Champions League.
Despite twice edging ahead against West Ham United last weekend, Thomas Tuchel’s men were eventually beaten 3-2. In mid-week, a late goal in Russia denied them victory and top spot in Group H against Zenit St Petersburg in a 3-3 draw.
To make matters worse, Tuchel has also confirmed that a number of players will miss the game through injury.
Speaking in his pre-match press conference, he said: "Trevoh Chalobah is still out," he said. "[Mateo] Kovacic is obviously out, N'Golo Kante out for tomorrow and Ben Chilwell too."
He continued by confirming that Jorginho will play despite not being 100 per cent fit. The Italian missed the game against Zenit due to back pain but will return for today's clash with Leeds.
"Jorginho did the last two training sessions and will do what he did the last game [against West Ham], play through pain," Tuchel said.
Ruben Loftus-Cheek was also ruled out ahead of the Zenit game after suffering an injury in the warm-up to the Champions League clash.
The Blues boss didn't mention his name in the list of injured Chelsea players, so it remains to be seen whether he will be fit enough to start the game.
With players struggling to be fit and ready for Leeds, Tuchel may be forced into adjusting his starting line-up. With that in mind, let's take a look at three possible starting XI's for the Blues.
Providing Jorginho and Loftus-Cheek are fit to start
With Kante and Kovacic absent, Jorginho and Loftus-Cheek are the obvious candidates to start in the middle of Tuchel's preferred 3-4-3 formation.
Although Tuchel's words seem to suggest that at least one of them will get the starting nod, with both of their fitnesses an issue, the German may be forced to have a cautious approach to his line-up.
However, if they each pass the last-minute fitness tests, it would make sense to start both from the get-go.
Possible line-up one (3-4-3): Mendy; Rudiger, Silva, Christensen; Alonso, Loftus-Cheek, Jorginho, James; Mount, Werner, Lukaku.
Mount drops deep
Providing Jorginho bows out in the warm-up - which is a possibility given how much pain he's been in recent weeks - Chelsea may be forced to address the situation by dropping Mason Mount into a deeper central role.
The 22-year-old is always a near-certainty to start and has largely been deployed on the left of a front-three in recent weeks, but as a midfielder by trade, he may be able to cover for either Jorginho or Loftus-Cheek.
As a result, one of the three wide spots would be vacant, meaning Timo Werner, Hakim Ziyech, Christian Pulisic, Kai Havertz and Callum Hudson-Odoi would fight it out for a starting place.
Possible line-up two (3-4-3): Mendy; Rudiger, Silva, Christensen; Alonso, Loftus-Cheek, Mount, James; Pulisic, Werner, Lukaku.
No Lukaku
The argument to leave Lukaku out has been discussed at lengths in recent weeks.
Although the Belgian scored in the week, his form before his injury wasn't the best. Plus, without him, the Blues were playing free-flowing football and scoring regularly.
Leaving him on the bench is a possibility, so here's how Chelsea could line-up with their £97.5million man on the bench.
Possible line-up three (3-4-3): Mendy; Rudiger, Silva, Christensen; Alonso, Loftus-Cheek, Jorginho, James; Pulisic, Mount, Havertz, Werner.
