If Chelsea miss out on qualifying for the Champions League on goal difference, it will come as no surprise to Cesc Fabregas.

During the post-mortems which have followed disappointing results, one flaw has stood out to Fabregas more than any other.

“We haven’t scored enough given the amount of chances we have created,” said the midfielder. “When we analyse videos of our games, the amount of chances we have created is unreal.

“There have been so many games where we should have won but we didn’t. The Spurs [lost 3-1] and West Ham [drew 1-1] games for example — that’s five more points we should have.

“People say we didn’t play well enough, which is maybe true, I don’t know. But we have not been clinical and that has been our weakest point. This season it hasn’t been how it usually was in front of goal in the past few years.” Fabregas has a point. Chelsea are in danger of scoring the second-fewest League goals for a season in the Roman Abramovich era. They have 61 goals, which is just two more than during the nadir of 2015-16.

As much as Chelsea have appeared defensively weak at times, they have conceded just one more than the title-winning team of 12 months ago. But they have 24 fewer in the goals for column.

The Blues are the lowest scorers in the top six and Opta statistics reveal only Crystal Palace and Southampton have failed to convert more clear-cut opportunities.

Such profligacy will come back to haunt them should they beat Huddersfield tonight and Newcastle on Sunday, but see Liverpool defeat Brighton and finish level on points. The same fate lies in store should Spurs take four points from their remaining two fixtures.

Their rivals’ goal difference (Liverpool +42, Tottenham +36) is superior to Chelsea’s (+27). So who is to blame? Opta claim Antonio Conte’s side have created the fewest clear-cut chances of the top six.

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But Alvaro Morata’s struggle to emulate Diego Costa has to be a factor. The latter scored 20 League goals last term, the former has just 11.

January-signing Olivier Giroud has helped pick up six crucial points with key strikes in victories over Southampton and Liverpool and, significantly, Fabregas says his introduction has made a difference.

“Oli is helping us a lot in certain things that maybe we were lacking,” he said. “The most important is he is scoring big goals, which is what we ask. This is what we want — the strikers put their chances away and make the team win points.

“It’s true that as a whole group we could have done better but the main problem has been not scoring enough.”

Given how well Huddersfield defended against Manchester City to secure a 0-0 draw on Sunday, Chelsea cannot afford to be wasteful tonight. “We know the plan they have,” said Fabregas. “I’m sure they will want to do the same as at City and try their best to get the point to secure their place in the Premier League. We have to play our game, be positive and with commitment.”

And most importantly of all, take their chances.