Chelsea make the short trip to Brentford on Saturday as Enzo Maresca\u2019s side continue a run of London fixtures to open the 2025\/26 Premier League season. The visitors arrive with encouraging results while Cole Palmer works his way back from a groin injury. Maresca has said that a decision will be made on Palmer after Friday\u2019s training session, but the playmaker may not start anyway, even if he\u2019s deemed fit. The Chelsea boss has to consider the upcoming Champions League fixture away at Bayern Munich on Wednesday.<\/p>\n
Brentford will hope Chelsea are still without Palmer. Keith Andrews\u2019 side look to recover from the 2\u20131 defeat at Sunderland on 30\/08\/25 and build on the narrow 1\u20130 victory over Aston Villa on 23\/08\/25. Andrews registered his first Premier League win since succeeding Thomas Frank, despite summer departures that left many projecting a difficult campaign. Brentford also registered earlier results including Bournemouth 0\u20132 Brentford on 26\/08\/25, Nottingham Forest 3\u20131 Brentford on 17\/08\/25 and a 2\u20132 draw with Borussia M\u00f6nchengladbach on 08\/08\/25.<\/p>\n
Chelsea\u2019s recent results include Chelsea 2\u20130 Fulham (30\/08\/25), West Ham 1\u20135 Chelsea (22\/08\/25), Chelsea 0\u20130 Crystal Palace (17\/08\/25), Chelsea 4\u20131 AC Milan (10\/08\/25) and wins over Bayer Leverkusen and Borussia M\u00f6nchengladbach in pre-season fixtures listed on 08\/08\/25.<\/p>\n
Team news for Brentford is broadly positive. Vitaly Janelt is available again after a heel injury, Michael Kayode, who had been taken ill while on Italy Under-21 duty, is fit, and Deadline Day arrival Reiss Nelson \u201cwill play a part,\u201d Andrews has confirmed. Paris Maghoma and Gustavo Gomes remain sidelined.<\/p>\n
Maresca faces selection choices. Liam Delap could be out until December with a hamstring injury and Levi Colwill remains a long-term absentee. Andrey Santos, Jo\u00e3o Pedro and Est\u00eav\u00e3o returned late from international duty and injuries may force Santos and Pedro into the starting XI. D\u00e1rio Essugo has joined the treatment table and Rom\u00e9o Lavia is unlikely to be available this weekend.<\/p>\n
Predicted Brentford XI (4-2-3-1): Kelleher; Kayode, Collins, Van den Berg, Henry; Henderson, Jensen; Ouattara, Damsgaard, Schade; Thiago.<\/p>\n
Predicted Chelsea XI (4-2-3-1): S\u00e1nchez; James, Chalobah, Adarabioyo, Cucurella; Caicedo, Sandro; Neto, Fern\u00e1ndez, Gittens; Pedro.<\/p>\n
Chelsea possess clear quality on paper but several members of Maresca\u2019s squad travelled long distances during the international break, which may affect preparation. Brentford have lost key components over the summer yet early signs indicate they remain a resilient Premier League side capable of surprises.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Chelsea visit Brentford as Cole Palmer nears a return; Andrews seeks consistency with the Bees. 2025<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2728,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[728,190,172],"tags":[944,319,945],"class_list":["post-2729","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-brentford","category-chelsea","category-epl","tag-andrey-santos","tag-cole-palmer","tag-dario-essugo"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2729","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2729"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2729\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2728"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2729"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2729"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2729"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}