STATS POINT TO CHELSEA LANDING A KNOCKOUT BLOW

Chelsea and Lille have met in just one European campaign previously – the 2019-20 UEFA Champions League – when the English side won both group stage matches by the same 2-1 scoreline. Chelsea have only lost one of their previous 10 home European matches against sides from France (W6 D3), a 2-1 defeat by Paris Saint-Germain in March 2016 which knocked the Blues out of the Champions League.

This will be Lille’s ninth Champions League match against a side from England, and third versus Chelsea. Their other six games all came against Manchester United, with only one of their eight such matches ending in victory (D2 L5), a 1-0 win over the Red

Devils in November 2005 via a goal from former Spurs player Milenko Acimovic. English and French teams have previously been drawn against one another on 14 occasions in the knockout stages of the Champions League, with sides from both countries progressing seven times each. However, of the three times the English team played the first leg at home, only one has progressed – Manchester Utd (v PSG) in 2018-19. Only Manchester City (15) and Bayern Munich (14) have won more Champions League matches than Chelsea (13) since the start of last season, who – before 2020-21 – had been eliminated in five consecutive knockout ties from 2013-14.

Lille are appearing in only their second last-16 Champions League tie, and first since a two-legged defeat to Manchester United in 2006-07, when they lost 1-0 both home and away. Chelsea are the first holders of the Champions League to progress as group runners-up since Real Madrid in 2017-18, who retained their title. The most recent current champions to be eliminated in the last 16 were Liverpool in 2019-20 (v Atletico Madrid).

Lille (7) come into this round as the lowest-scoring group winners since Leicester City and Atletico Madrid in 2016-17 (also 7 each). Jonathan David has scored in their past three games. Should the 22-year-old Canadian score at Stamford Bridge, Lionel Messi (21y 155d in November 2008) will be the only non-European player to score in four straight matches in the competition at a younger age.

Since his first campaign in the competition in 2017-18, Timo Werner (14) has scored more Champions League goals than any other German. Including finals, Chelsea head coach Thomas Tuchel has progressed/won 73 percent of his Champions League knockout ties (8/11). Only three managers boast a higher rate among those to have overseen at least 10 knockout ties – Vicente del Bosque (80%), Josef Heynckes (86%) and Zinedine Zidane (88%).