Third match of Chelsea’s pre-season, and the final one on United States soil before we return to Europe. To wrap up their US tour the Blues will take on rivals Arsenal in Orlando, to the delight of local and national fans who will be witness to a major English derby at Camping World Stadium — one of the venues for the 1994 World Cup.
Although there is bad blood between the Blues and the Gunners, collective minds should remain on pre-season mode and getting ready for official matches in two weeks’ time. At the same time this should be a great opportunity for first-team hopefuls wanting to make a good impression on manager Thomas Tuchel, even if he might soon add another piece from market to solve his squad puzzle this season.
Date / Time: Saturday, July 23, 2022, 8:00pm EDT; 1:00 BST (next day); 5:30am IST (next day)
Venue: Camping World Stadium, Orlando, FL, USA
Forecast: Hot and sunny
On TV: none (USA); none (UK); Sony TEN 1 (India); SuperSport MaXimo 2, SuperSport Premier League (NGA); elsewhere
Streaming: ESPN+ (USA); Chelsea TV (UK); Sony LIV, JioTV (India); DStv Now (NGA)
Arsenal team news: Our North London rivals joined the Florida Cup last Thursday after beating 1. FC Nürnberg 5-3 at their opponents’ turf in Germany, and Everton 2-0 at M&T Bank Stadium in Baltimore (MD). In their opening FC match they got another win, this time over hosts Orlando City SC by managing a 3-1 scoreline in a ‘tale of two halves’ as described by our friends over at the Short Fuse.
Notable absences from pre-season thus far are defenders Kieran Tierney and Takehiro Tomiyasu, and attacker Emile Smith Rowe. All of which have been missing due to slight problems, according to Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta.
The match is the last of Gunners and Blues’ USA pre-season tours with the former hoping to make it a clean sweep following wins over Everton and Orlando City. Meanwhile, Thomas Tuchel’s side have beaten Club America and lost a penalty shoot-out against Charlotte so far.
With both clubs active in the summer transfer window there could be a couple of debutants on show with Fabio Vieira hoping to get his first run out for Arsenal, while Kalidou Koulibaly could make his first Chelsea appearance after joining in a £33m deal from Napoli last week.
Elsewhere Oleksandr Zinchenko could be thrust straight into the action after his £32m transfer was confirmed on Friday evening thus setting up an immediate mini-reunion of the Manchester City old boys including teammate Gabriel Jesus and Blues summer signing Raheem Sterling.
For Mikel Arteta and Thomas Tuchel, this will be the latest chance to determine where their players are at in terms of fitness and experiment with tactics ahead of the new season.
Kaya Kaynak and Tashan Deniran-Alleyne will be keeping Arsenal fans updated with all the happenings from the game whilst Adam Newson and Scott Trotter have all things Chelsea covered. Scroll down for all of our latest updates from the Camping World Stadium with the game due to kick-off at 1am UK Time.