We said: Watford 0-2 Chelsea
Any hopes of Watford repeating their recent 4-1 thrashing of Man United or similar 2018 success against the Blues will surely be dashed here, with Ranieri's depleted outfit no match for a freshened-up Chelsea.
Tuchel's side have conceded just one goal on the road all season and have bountiful options for rotation in the final third, so we can only envisage the Blues returning to winning ways comfortably.
Read more.Data Analysis
Our analysis of all available data, including recent performances and player stats up until an hour before kickoff, suggested the most likely outcome of this match was a Chelsea win with a probability of 68.19%. A draw had a probability of 19.4% and a win for Watford had a probability of 12.36%.
The most likely scoreline for a Chelsea win was 0-2 with a probability of 12.79%. The next most likely scorelines for that outcome were 0-1 (12.34%) and 1-2 (9.57%). The likeliest drawn scoreline was 1-1 (9.23%), while for a Watford win it was 1-0 (4.45%). The actual scoreline of 1-2 was predicted with a 9.6% likelihood. Our team at Sports Mole and our data analysis both correctly predicted that Chelsea would win this match.