Good afternoon and welcome to Sports Mole's live text coverage of the Premier League clash between Huddersfield Town and Chelsea at the John Smith's Stadium.
The hosts come into the 2018-19 campaign having defied expectations to stay in the Premier League last term, but the odds are once again against David Wagner's side to stay up this season.
Chelsea, meanwhile, are bidding to return to the top four under new manager Maurizio Sarri, who replaced Antonio Conte in charge at Stamford Bridge during the summer.
Make sure you don't miss a moment of the action courtesy of our minute-by-minute coverage below.
It is the turn of Huddersfield Town and Chelsea to get their domestic campaigns underway at the John Smith's Stadium today, with plenty of intrigue surrounding both teams ahead of the 2018-19 season.
We will take a close look at both clubs in a short while, but let's start with the team news...
Well, the headline news as far as Chelsea are concerned is that Kepa Arrizabalaga is handed his debut between the sticks, having only arrived for a world-record sum earlier this week.
The new most expensive goalkeeper of all time replaces Thibaut Courtois for Chelsea - and manager Maurizio Sarri has already admitted that he is not yet at Courtois's level - but he has certainly shown enough signs during his career so far that he has the ability to get to that sort of standard.
A seven-year contract is a huge show of faith in the shot-stopper, and he will be keen to begin repaying that this afternoon.
Chelsea pulled off something of a coup by beating Manchester City to the signing of Jorginho and he looks very well suited to the Premier League, so it will be interesting to see how he gets on today.
The Spaniard lost his place to Olivier Giroud towards the end of last season, but he gets the nod from Sarri to lead the line today, with Giroud on the bench. Whether that decision is influenced by Giroud's World Cup exploits remains to be seen, but this is a good opportunity for Morata to remind people why Chelsea paid such big money for him.
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One big change for Chelsea this season will be getting to grips with the new 4-3-3 formation after so long under the 3-4-3 system which brought them success under Antonio Conte. Rudiger and the back-in-favour David Luiz are given the nod at the heart of the defence today.
Pritchard and Mounie lead the line this afternoon as they look to get off to a good start, but it is Laurent Depoitre - who only makes the bench - who has scored their previous two Premier League goals against Chelsea.
There are a number of new faces in the ranks too, although the likes of Diakhaby and Ramadan Sobhi both have to settle for a place on the bench.
Terence Kongolo is also technically a new signing - a club-record one, no less - but he is not a new face in the team having made his loan move from Monaco permanent this summer.
Huddersfield did what they needed to do last term, of course, and there are other new players to come in, but they will likely need to be even better this season and today's starting XI does not exactly suggest a huge amount of improvement.
This is only their second season in the Premier League, and even their promotion was a significant surprise, yet alone staying the division last term. Promoted clubs can often struggle in the second season, but in David Wagner Huddersfield have a manager who can seemingly do no wrong.
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Without taking anything away from the Terriers' achievement of avoiding relegation last season, they were perhaps fortunate that so many teams suffered dreadful campaigns last term. The same may not be the case this time around, so they will need to be better than they were in 2017-18 if they are to make it to a third season in the Premier League.
However, there are a number of issues which need to be addressed this term; only relegated Swansea lost more games than Huddersfield's 19 last season, only Stoke conceded more goals in the bottom six and, crucially, Wagner's side scored a league-low 28 goals all season.
Indeed, Huddersfield ended the campaign by scoring only three goals in their final 10 Premier League games - a poor run of form which included just one victory, four draws and five defeats.
Facing Chelsea first up is difficult enough - even if this may be a good time to take on the Blues - but Huddersfield must then travel to champions Manchester City in their second game of the season. Newly-promoted Cardiff are next up in what could prove to be an early-season six-pointer before Everton and Crystal Palace round off their first five games.
Ominously, Huddersfield will face seven of last season's top nine teams in their opening nine games of the campaign.
The Terriers won just one of their final five home games of the season - scoring just once in that run too - and no team scored fewer goals on their own turf than Wagner's side across the entire campaign.
Brushing aside a 3-0 defeat to Accrington Stanley early in their preparations, Huddersfield are otherwise unbeaten so far this summer, with four wins and two draws to go with that defeat. That includes three successive wins in their most recent trio of matches, which has also seen the claim the scalps of Lyon, Bologna and RB Leipzig.
It has been a summer of transition for the Blues, and not one which has gone exactly how the club would have wanted either. The process of getting rid of Conte and appointing Sarri took longer than anyone hoped, leaving the incoming boss with less time to sculpt the team in his image.
However, Sarri did impress at Napoli so it will be interesting to see how he fares in the Premier League.
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None of their other opening five opponents finished higher than 10th last season, though, with Newcastle, Bournemouth and Cardiff following on from that game against the Gunners.
Chelsea actually won as many games as Liverpool last term, but they finished five points adrift of the Reds courtesy of 10 defeats over the course of the campaign - just the third time in the past 17 seasons that they have reached double figures for number of defeats in a Premier League campaign.
However, it is the intervening years between their title wins which have been the biggest disappointments for Chelsea, finishing 10th in 2015-16 and then fifth last season.
Chelsea lost the opening game of last season too - a 3-2 defeat to Burnley at Stamford Bridge which saw them have two players sent off - so we may be able to learn a decent amount from what happens today.
A two-match winless to end last season also means that a draw or defeat today would see Chelsea go three Premier League games without a win for the first time since September 2016, although that was followed by a 13-match winning streak.
Perhaps the best indicator we have had from the summer came in the Community Shield, though, and if that is the case then Sarri has plenty of work still to do if they are to run Man city close for the title this season.
This is as good a time as any to face a Chelsea team getting to grips with a big change, and most other teams would fancy their chances of getting something out of the game. Huddersfield lack firepower, though, and today may be the start of an arduous campaign for them. I am going for an away win!
SPORTS MOLE SAYS: Huddersfield 0-2 Chelsea
Since then these two teams have met on eight occasions in the league, with Chelsea winning five of those and the remaining three ending all square.
The most recent clash between the two sides came just three months ago when Huddersfield's 1-1 draw at Stamford Bridge was enough to ensure that they would enjoy a second season in the Premier League.
Indeed, Huddersfield have now lost each of their last four home league clashes with Chelsea, and another defeat today would make it five in a row against a single opponent for the first time in the club's history.
HUDDERSFIELD STARTING XI: Hamer; Hadergjonaj, Zanka, Schindler, Kongolo, Lowe; Mooy, Hogg, Billing; Pritchard, Mounie
CHELSEA STARTING XI: Kepa; Azpilicueta, Rudiger, Luiz, Alonso; Jorginho, Kante, Barkley; Willian, Pedro, Morata
I questioned how the World Cup winner would fare in a more advanced role, and this is about as good a start as he could have hoped for by already matching last season's goal tally!
Pedro drives forward through the middle and gives the ball out to Willian, whose cross to the back post finds Kante in a bit of space. It isn't a textbook finish by any means - Kante shinned the volley and sent it bouncing into the ground - but it ends up in the back of the net and that is all that matters.
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A corner into the box is flicked on towards the back post where Mounie is waiting, and he steers it towards goal. Kepa is beaten, but the debutant is saved by his upright, with the ball bouncing off the inside of the post and then back out before being hacked away to safety.
1 - N'Golo Kante's opener for Chelsea was his first goal in the Premier League since September 2017, and just his fourth in 107 appearances in the competition overall. Surprise. pic.twitter.com/xLIzca8Xbu
— OptaJoe (@OptaJoe) August 11, 2018
Premier League debutant Jorginho steps up to take the spot kick and is coolness personified, rolling the ball into the net after sending Hamer the wrong way.
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The Terriers have played pretty well so far and have been more than a match for Chelsea, but the Blues have been clinical without being spectacular, scoring with their only two shots on target so far.
Willian provided the cross to the back post where Kante - who looks set to play in a more advanced position under Sarri - was waiting. Kante's volley was scuffed and bounced into the ground, but crucially it ended up nestling in the far corner.
It was a very cool spot kick from the summer signing, who sent the keeper the wrong way before stroking the ball in. Alonso won the penalty after bursting into the box, being brought down by a rash Schindler challenge.
8 - Jorginho is just the eighth player to score a penalty on his Premier League debut, after Brian Deane, Alan Thompson, Fabrizio Ravanelli, Peter Kennedy, Adam Le Fondre, Roberto Soldado and Alexandre Pato. Eclectic. pic.twitter.com/WUxwyuFFlr
— OptaJoe (@OptaJoe) August 11, 2018
The fans want a corner, but the referee draws their ire even more by awarding a goal kick.
Hazard is the architect, driving forward through the middle with a trademark run and drawing the defence before teeing up Pedro, who finds himself in acres of space. The keeper comes out to close the angle, but Pedro cooly dinks the ball over Hamer and in.
Lovely finish.
Goals from N'Golo Kante, debutant Jorginho and Pedro ensure that the Blues get off to a winning start in the Premier League, but for Huddersfield there is plenty of work to be done, not least going forward where last season's problems are still evident.
Thank you very much for joining Sports Mole for today's Premier League opener as Chelsea get their campaign off to a perfect start with a comfortable 3-0 win over Huddersfield. I will leave you with our match report, and be sure to stick around for reaction too!
We also have live coverage of Wolves' return to the top flight against Everton, which you can find by clicking here.
From me, though, it is goodbye for now!
