Chelsea news: Has Cole Palmer become lukewarm?

By his own lofty standards, Cole Palmer is enduring a relatively modest spell.

After beginning the season with six goals and five assists in his first seven Premier League appearances, Palmer has registered eight goals – two from the penalty spot – and one assist in the 17 league games since the October international break.

The second half of this run has coincided with a winter malaise that has reduced Chelsea from title challengers to merely top-four hopefuls.

However, despite the slight reduction in output, the creativity he offers his team has not deteriorated.

Palmer’s 66 chances created is the highest in the division. The 32 chances he has created in the Premier League since 4 December is the most in any of Europe’s top five leagues – yet he has not registered an assist in this period.

Despite what Fantasy Premier League says, his cross deflected into the net by Aaron Wan-Bissaka in the win over West Ham does not officially count.

An eight-game scoring drought from Nicolas Jackson has not helped, with the Senegal forward missing the most of these 32 chances [seven].

Over the course of the season as well, Palmer still averages a goal every 150 minutes of league football. Out of players who have started 10 Premier League games or more, this is bettered only by Erling Haaland, Mohammed Salah, Alexander Isak, Chris Wood and Bournemouth’s Justin Kluivert.

When you take away penalties – a key facet to his output – the 22-year-old is only two goals behind the 13 non-penalty goals he got in his devastating breakout campaign.

Chelsea’s inconsistency and chaos as a club has been juxtaposed by Palmer’s coolness and relentlessly impressive performances since the moment he arrived in west London.

There is nothing in the numbers to suggest his slight dip in production is anything but temporary and, with some more clinical finishing by his team-mates, it would likely have gone unnoticed.

*All stats provided by Opta