Empty Stadium, Neto's Rays and Delap's Chelsea Debut

ATLANTA, TUESDAY — Chelsea began their adventure in the FIFA Club World Cup with a positive note, securing a 2-0 victory over Los Angeles FC on Tuesday (17/6/2025) early morning WIB. Despite the positive result for "The Blues," the sixth match in the 2025 Club World Cup highlighted concerns regarding the low enthusiasm of supporters to fill the stadium stands.

The Mercedes-Benz Stadium in the United States hosted its first match in the 2025 Club World Cup, witnessing the victory of "The Blues" over the home representative, LAFC. The sports arena, which serves as the home ground for Atlanta United in Major League Soccer (MLS), is the newest stadium with the largest capacity in the "Land of Uncle Sam."

Since its inauguration in August 2017, the Mercedes-Benz Stadium has been equipped with a seating capacity of approximately 73,019 individual seats. However, Chelsea's presence to inaugurate the stadium at the 2025 Club World Cup failed to attract supporters to witness the match in person.

Chelsea's status as one of the best teams in the English League and the champion of the Europa Conference League has proven insufficient for attracting spectators. FIFA scheduled Chelsea to play on Monday (16/6/2026) afternoon local time. This is suspected to be the reason why the stadium stands appeared empty on the television screen.

Official match data indicates that only 22,137 supporters were present in the stands. The average audience was concentrated in the lowest tier of the stands. The number of occupied seats was very minimal in the second tier. Meanwhile, the third tier was completely devoid of spectators.

The number of spectators set a record low for international matches held at the Mercedes-Benz Stadium. The previous lowest attendance was recorded when Mexico drew with Uzbekistan in a friendly match in November 2023, which saw an attendance of 33,817 supporters.

Si Biru also played a preseason match in 2023 at that stadium. The match against Newcastle United, which ended in a 1-1 draw, was witnessed by 70,789 spectators, nearly filling the venue.

The good thing for Liam (Delap) is that he understood our way of playing quickly.

The number of spectators watching the match between Chelsea and LAFC was also far from the average attendance at Atlanta United's home games in MLS 2025. An average of 44,037 spectators attended Atlanta's matches in person. Unsurprisingly, Atlanta is the team with the highest stadium occupancy rate for home games in MLS this season.

Chelsea manager Enzo Maresca acknowledged that his team felt a very strange atmosphere playing in a magnificent stadium but with minimal spectators. Chelsea is accustomed to playing in venues that are nearly full in the Premier League. The average attendance of supporters at home matches for the Blues is 39,987 out of a capacity of 41,631 at Stamford Bridge Stadium.

"I think this environment is strange, the stadium is almost empty rather than full. We are professionals who must adapt to this situation," said Maresca as reported by BBC.

The Mercedes-Benz Stadium will still host five matches of the 2025 Club World Cup, two of which are in the group stage involving Inter Miami vs. Porto and Manchester City vs. Al-Ain. Then, there will be two matches in the round of 16 and one quarter-final match.

In addition, the Mercedes-Benz Stadium will also be one of the stadiums for the 2026 World Cup. Seven matches are scheduled to be held at the stadium, including one of the semifinal matches.

LAFC coach Steve Cherundolo believes that the incident of an empty stadium in Atlanta cannot be generalized as a reflection of the United States' disinterest in soccer. According to him, other states continue to enthusiastically welcome matches in the Club World Cup.

"I think every place presents a different situation. At the Rose Bowl in LA, the stadium was nearly full when PSG and Atletico Madrid played. Perhaps LA prefers soccer more than Atlanta," said Cherundolo.

Chelsea secured a victory to lead the competition for advancement to the knockout stage from Group D, thanks to goals from Pedro Neto (34th minute) and Enzo Fernandez (79th minute). In addition to scoring, Neto was the player who most troubled the LAFC defense.

In addition to making three shots, including one that hit the crossbar at the end of the match, Neto was very creative by producing four key passes. This was the highest number of key pass creations in the match.

The player from Portugal completed five successful dribbles, particularly navigating the left side of LAFC's defense. In Chelsea's opening goal, Neto outsmarted LAFC's goalkeeper, Hugo Lloris, by first deceiving two LAFC defenders in a positive transition scheme.

Attention also turned to Chelsea's new striker recruited from Ipswich Town, Liam Delap. Coming on in the 64th minute to replace Nicolas Jackson, Delap immediately made his important contribution by providing an assist for Fernandez's goal.

If referring to performance as the spearhead, Delap's debut appearance at Chelsea could be considered poor. He failed to make a single shot. However, Delap exchanged this for a collective role to create space for his teammates. One chance created and two key passes are evidence that Delap has great potential to become a new mainstay in the attacking line of the Blues.

“The good thing for Liam (Delap) is that he understood our way of playing quickly,” said Maresca of his impressions of Delap.

Delap acknowledged that he was warmly welcomed by the manager and his new teammates at Chelsea. This situation has made him very eager to make a positive impact on the team, even though he has only undergone a few training sessions.

"I am happy to assist the team (with assists), but I am also ambitious to score many goals. I have always enjoyed having competition to secure a starting position," said Delap, who will compete with Jackson for the sole striker position at Chelsea, to Channel 5. (AFP)