Santos the natural replacement for suspended Caicedo?

Moises Caicedo's form has been a key reason for Chelsea's fine start to the season - but the Blues will be without the Ecuador midfielder for their next three Premier League games because of his red card in Sunday's draw against Arsenal.

Brazil international Andrey Santos would appear the most likely candidate to replace him in the starting XI if Enzo Maresca is planning a like-for-like swap for upcoming matches against Leeds, Bournemouth and Everton.

Santos spent last season on loan at Strasbourg and Maresca has given the 21-year-old plenty of game time since his return to Stamford Bridge. He has appeared in 15 of Chelsea's 20 matches so far in 2025-26, having featured in four games during their successful Club World Cup campaign during the summer.

Nine of those appearances have come in the Premier League - three starts and a further six as a substitute.

The statistics from Santos' 318 minutes of Premier League action this season are fairly comparable with Caicedo's in his 983 minutes across several metrics, as shown in the table above.

Caicedo's tackle success rate (58.8%) is marginally higher than Santos' 54.6%, while the Brazilian has a better success rate in duels (61.1% to Caicedo's 57.3%).

Caicedo has won possession 61 times in the league this season, although it is noticeable that only two of those have come in Chelsea's attacking third. Santos has done so on three occasions from a total of 16 ball recoveries, even though he has played less than a third of the minutes that Caicedo has.

Offensively, Santos has also played four "key" passes compared to five from Caicedo.

Caicedo has scored three league goals this term and, if given the nod to start, Santos will hope to add to his solitary strike so far for Chelsea, which came against Wolves in the Carabao Cup fourth round. But he clearly has an eye for a goal, as demonstrated by his tally of 10 in France's top division for Strasbourg last season.

All of which points to Santos doing his work a little further up the pitch, so could his inclusion result in a minor tactical tweak by Maresca and the top flight's third-highest scorers looking even more adventurous?

Statistics courtesy of Opta.