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Former Manchester United striker Dimitar Berbatov has made his score prediction for Chelsea's Premier League home game with Fulham on Saturday (January 13).
The Blues are coming off a surprise 1-0 loss at Championship side Middlesbrough in midweek in the Carabao Cup semifinal in midweek. That snapped their three-game winning run across competitions.
Mauricio Pochettino's side had beaten Crystal Palace 2-1 at home and won 3-2 at Luton Town in the league to end the year, moving up to tenth in the standings, 17 points off leaders Liverpool (45) after 20 games. Following that, they opened their FA Cup campaign with a convincing 4-0 home win over Luton Town last weekend.
However, considering the side's inconsistent displays, as evident in their outing at the Riverside, Berbatov is unsure which version of the Blues would turn up against the Cottagers. The Bulgarian wrote in his column for Betfair:
"I don't know what to say anymore when it comes to Chelsea, honestly. So many teams are struggling to put the ball in the net at the moment. It shows you how important it is to have a striker who can score goals and how good it is if you have more than one guy to score the goals."
Predicting a 1-1 draw, he continued:
"When you don't have the players who can score then your game suffers. You draw 0-0 or you lose games. If it continues then the only logical thing to do is to go out on the training pitch and continue to do what you've done before - trying to put the ball in the back of the net. Based on Chelsea's performance against Middlesbrough, I'll go for a draw in this one."
The Blues will next host Middlesbrough in the deciding leg of their EFL Cup semifinal on January 24.
What happened in Chelsea's reverse fixture against Fulham in the Premier League this season?
Chelsea visited Fulham on matchday seven in October and emerged with all three points, courtesy of a 2-0 win.
Mykhailo Mudryk and Armando Broja scored within a minute of each other as the Blues won for the second time in seven league games. Both Blues goals came in the first half, with Mudryk opening the scoring in the 18th minute before Broja doubled their advantage just a minute later.
Four Blues players saw yellow cards in the game, including three in the second half, but the visitors hung on for the win. It was Pochettino's side's first win in four league games since beating Luton Town 3-0 at home on matchday three.
