Villa unlikely to shock Chelsea again – even with Benteke

Chelsea are 6/1 at BetVictor for the Europa League after the draw paired them with Sparta Prague and a potential tie with the winners of the Ajax v Steau Bucharest in the last 16.

Holders Atletico Madrid are also 6/1 with Inter (likely to meet Tottenham in the last 16) 12s, Anzhi, Napoli and Spurs 14s and 16/1 Bar.

The Blues may have been out of luck in Japan but they showed little sign of jetlag when beating Leeds on Wednesday night in the Capital One Cup and they are 1/2 to lift the trophy at Wembley in May.

They are back to the bread and butter of Premier League action this weekend and meet an Aston Villa side who won 3-1 at Anfield last weekend and beat the Blues by the same scoreline at the Bridge 12 months ago.

That was in the AVB days and we bet 80/1 for an improbable hat-trick of 1-3 results!

Chelsea are 1/3 to grab the points with an improving Villa 9/1.

This is likely to be a dress rehearsal for Wembley and the Capital One Cup final in February and the Blues can have a close look at Villa’s 21-year-old Belgian striker Christian Benteke, who has made quite an impact.

QPR had a great win against Fulham but they now need that elusive victory on the road and there are worse places to go this weekend than Newcastle given the Magpies have chronic injury problems and are low on confidence.

A month ago and Newcastle would be long odds-on favourites – now they are 11/10 with the draw 5/2 and the Hoops 11/4 at Betvictor.

Demba Ba is likely to be on his way in the January window if any club is willing to part with £7m and if the Geordies don’t get off to a fast start I can see the natives getting extremely restless.

Ba is 9/2 to open the scoring with the in-form Adel Taarabt 19/2 to score first and 11/4 to score at any time during the 90 minutes.

Rangers are still 8/11 for the drop (evens to stay up) although a win on Tyneside will take them within four points of Newcastle, who have had such a wretched start to the season after their heroics of last term.

Djribil Cisse has scored in three of his league outings against Newcastle and is 2/1 to score at any time on Saturday.

Fulham didn’t turn up until it was all too late last weekend at Loftus Road and someone soon is going to get a hiding at Anfield.

Liverpool were well beaten by Villa but they still had plenty of chances and one of these days will take their share. Let’s hope it isn’t on Saturday.

Fulham were winners at Liverpool last season but they have only scored three times in 11 league visits to Anfield.

That said, 14 of the 17 games involving Fulham have produced more than 2.5 goals so far this season and three or more goals is 4/6 on Saturday with two or fewer 5/4.

For all your Christmas odds check out betvictor.com

Be lucky

Charlie