We look ahead to Saturday’s Premier League game at the Vitality Stadium with our Bournemouth vs Chelsea prediction and preview. Two sides looking for their second league win of the season meet on the south coast following the international break.
Bournemouth vs Chelsea Stats: The Key Insights
- The Opta supercomputer has Chelsea as the favourites to head back to London with the three points, winning 45.2% of pre-match simulations.
- Both Bournemouth and Chelsea have scored a joint league-high four second-half goals in the Premier League this season. All four of Bournemouth’s have been in the final five minutes of games (86th minute onwards), while all four of Chelsea’s came in their only prior away game against Wolves.
- Chelsea’s Premier League win rate in August is 61.1%, their highest in any month excluding June/July, while it drops to 47.8% in September (their second-lowest). Only Arsenal have a bigger such drop from one month to the next among ever-present sides in the competition (61.4% in October, 45.4% in November).
Chelsea head to the Vitality Stadium to face Bournemouth on Saturday looking to return from the international break with three points.
Enzo Maresca’s side have started the season with four points from three games, following up a rampant 6-2 triumph at Wolves with a somewhat disappointing 1-1 draw at home to Crystal Palace.
Bournemouth, meanwhile, remain unbeaten in the Premier League after a quite brilliant comeback victory at Everton last time out, scoring in the 87th, 92nd and 96th minutes to stun Goodison Park with a 3-2 win from two goals behind.
It’s the latest a team has come from two or more goals down to win a Premier League game, while it was also Bournemouth’s third win from two or more goals behind since their return to the competition in 2022, more than any other team in that time.
It means they head into Saturday looking to go four without defeat to begin a Premier League campaign for the first time, though they will be meeting a Chelsea side on a three-match winning streak on the road, last having a longer run between February and April 2022 (four).
Despite that strong recent away record, Chelsea have conceded at least once in each of their last 17 Premier League away games, shipping 36 goals in this run. Only once have they had a longer run without a clean sheet on the road in the competition, going 24 games between January 1993 and February 1994.
After a magnificent first season at Stamford Bridge, Cole Palmer has started this campaign in similarly impressive fashion, and he will look to continue that on Saturday after withdrawing from England duty with a knock.
As well as having the most assists (four), no player has created more big chances than Palmer in the Premier League this season (four).
Palmer is averaging a goal (23) or assist (15) every 76 minutes in the competition for Chelsea, the second-best rate of any player with at least 1,000 minutes for a specific club (behind only Erling Haaland, one every 67 with Manchester City).
Bournemouth have firepower of their own however in Antoine Semenyo. Though the former Bristol City man has only one goal to his name, he’s had more shots than any other Premier League player this season with 17.
In terms of injury news, Chelsea will remain without Reece James and Malo Gusto, though Roméo Lavia could return.
For Bournemouth, Phillip Billing could be fit after missing the last three matches. However, Enes Ünal and Tyler Adams both remain absent with injury.
Bournemouth vs Chelsea Head-to-Head
Bournemouth are winless in five Premier League meetings with Chelsea (two draws, three defeats), having won three of their previous four against the Blues prior to this (one loss).
Chelsea have lost just one of their seven Premier League away games against Bournemouth (four wins, two draws), with three of their four defeats in the competition against the Cherries coming at Stamford Bridge.
The last meeting between the sides was on the final Premier League matchday of last season, with Chelsea taking a 2-1 home victory thanks to goals from Moisés Caicedo and Raheem Sterling in what would prove to be Mauricio Pochettino’s final game in charge at Stamford Bridge.
Bournemouth vs Chelsea Prediction
Chelsea’s form on the road has been impressive of late, and they carry on that run with another away victory in 45.2% of the Opta supercomputer’s 10,000 pre-match simulations.
With home advantage behind them, Bournemouth could also fancy their chances of coming away with the three points, and they come out on top in 30.0% of simulations. A draw that would see Bournemouth’s unbeaten start to the season continue occurred 24.8% of the time.
Looking ahead to the rest of the season, the Opta supercomputer believes Chelsea have a real chance of finishing in the Champions League spots, doing so in 22.5% of simulations, though fifth is their likeliest finish. Bournemouth, meanwhile, are predicted to end the campaign safely in 13th, relegated in just 3.6% of simulations.
Bournemouth vs Chelsea Predicted Lineups
Bournemouth: Mark Travers, Milos Kerkez, Marcos Senesi, Illia Zabarnyi, Julián Araujo, Lewis Cook, Ryan Christie, Marcus Tavernier, Justin Kluivert, Antoine Semenyo, Evanilson
Chelsea: Robert Sánchez, Marc Cucurella, Levi Colwill, Wesley Fofana, Axel Disasi, Enzo Fernández, Moisés Caicedo, Pedro Neto, Cole Palmer, Noni Madueke, Nicolas Jackson.
Opta Power Rankings
The Opta Power Rankings are a global team ranking system that assigns an ability score to over 13,000 domestic football teams on a scale between zero and 100, where zero is the worst-ranked team in the world and 100 is the best team in the world.
Ahead of kick-off this weekend, here is the Opta Power Ranking for both sides.
Enjoy this? Subscribe to our football newsletter to receive exclusive weekly content. You should also follow our social accounts over on X, Instagram, TikTok and Facebook.