Chelsea

Will Faulks, Chelsea News, external

Chelsea's season so far has been a series of false starts.

Pre-season went very well, and the new manager and new recruits looked to have had the desired impact. Then Christopher Nkunku's injury in the final friendly disrupted all their preparations and forced a rethink at the worst possible moment.

Since then, there have been a number of false dawns, usually in the form of a good showing against the better teams they have played, or a comfortable win against the weaker teams.

But every time they look ready to get rolling, a shocking performance or bad result brings them back to earth, and while there is plenty of goodwill remaining for the coach, every passing week sees the team entrenched deeper in mid-table, with the teams at the top pulling farther away.

To break back into the European places, Chelsea are going to need a really strong run of results, and hope that things are going to suddenly click are fading too. Perhaps Nkunku's return will help things, but it already feels like an unrealistic amount of hope is being placed on the France striker's form when he is back.

Once he is up and running, it will be interesting to see what Mauricio Pochettino has planned for him. Might we see him used as a striker, given both Nicolas Jackson and Armando Broja are struggling for form and fitness?

It seems like one of the potential solutions to our problems, and at this rate, we are bound to try everything until something sticks.

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BBC Sport's chief football writer Phil McNulty has been answering your questions.

Ivan Obradovic: My team, Chelsea, go to Spurs tonight. Will this be a real measure of whether there has been any real progress under Mauricio Pochettino?

It will certainly give us an idea of where Chelsea are heading and, of course, we have the narrative of Pochettino’s return to a club where he was loved by fans.

I actually thought Chelsea were showing real signs of improvement when they drew with Arsenal, a game they should have won, but then of course they lost at home to Brentford.

I do think Chelsea are showing improvement under Pochettino but their lack of a reliable goalscorer has been hurting them. For all the scattergun transfer policy, Chelsea do have good players so it will be really interesting to see how they fare against a Spurs team doing so well.

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As Chelsea boss Mauricio Pochettino prepares to return to former club Tottenham on Monday, The Football News Show looks at what kind of reception the Argentine might receive in north London.