The odd times continue in football. Jose Mourinho was sacked last week by Spurs and it was hardly noticed with everything else that was going on. Tonight, Eden Hazard has a chance to play against Chelsea for the first time since he left us and in reality, it isn’t in the top-three talking points for Chelsea fans.Part of that is because for Eden, since he left Stamford Bridge and with one injury after another, his appearances have been severely limited in numbers and in quality. By the second leg at the Bridge, he may well be getting some serious form back. Personally I hope not, leave it another couple of weeks Eden!He might be one of our greatest-ever players, four-time player of the year and one of the most loved by our fans, but there are other more pressing concerns tonight for us. We will celebrate you another time Eden, I promise.

Vinicius Junior has been in improving form, Casemiro has been controlling midfield battles for months and Karim Benzema is once more a goal machine. Even though Real Madrid do share the goals around a bit, they are still very dependent on the Frenchman in the biggest games.The fact that this is an incredibly difficult game, and indeed tie, to call, underlines just how far Chelsea have come in the space of one season. It is hard to put your finger on exactly what has changed, but watching on Saturday against West Ham, the word ‘maturity’ kept on popping into my mind.Yes, we love what youngsters such as Mason Mount are doing, and once again he seemed to be everywhere at the London Stadium, but the deep knowledge that Thiago Silva, N’Golo Kante, Jorginho, Cesar Azpilicueta and Toni Rudiger provide is unquantifiable when you come to the latter stages of the Champions League.

I have no idea what team Thomas Tuchel will put out tonight, but even though each of the above players started at the weekend, there must be a huge temptation to start them all again. This is another chance to create history at the club, it is clearly the biggest game of the season so far, and experience is critical in these moments.Real Madrid aren’t short of some decent experience themselves with players like Luka Modric (35), Toni Kroos (31), Marcelo (33 next week) and Benzema (33) all possible starters. They are far from decrepit but these two matches are likely to be high-octane, stressful affairs which will stretch them physically, at least I hope they will.Real Madrid are closing in on Atletico Madrid in La Liga but they are still behind their neighbours. It has been far from a vintage season for Zinedene Zidane’s side, with the days of them getting 90+ points regularly alongside Barcelona little more than a distant memory. To compound that, I am not convinced it has been a vintage season for the Spanish top-flight in general. At the weekend there was a 0-0 home draw for Real against Real Betis as well as another scoreless draw away at lowly Getafe just nine days ago. Does this show a real malaise for Real at the end of the season, with a bunch of tiring players? Sadly for us, probably not.

Those ultra-experienced Real Madrid players know exactly when to conserve energy and though they would love to win their league, contrary to what you might think from what has happened over the last week, the club still does have a special attachment to the Champions League trophy. Success for these players and indeed for the fans of this club is measured in terms of that trophy, more than any other club in the continent. There is no doubt that their players know the history. If they win the trophy this season then it will be their 14th time as champions of Europe, precisely double that of their nearest challengers, AC Milan. It gives you a flavour of this competition’s importance to them, historically anyway.For this reason, I suspect they have been at slightly less than 100 per cent in La Liga of late, but each will attempt to bring their ‘A’ games tonight. It may well be that these older, experienced, shall we say, wiser players are generally the ones that stop you losing the game, but it might still be the case that it is the youthful vibrancy, lurking in the depths of the squads, that is what gets you through on this occasion.

I hope we play at a tempo they cannot live with. If we have to make a whole catalogue of substitutions in the second half then so be it, we will scarcely be weakened. Real on the other hand would be more damaged if they were forced into too many changes. I think the depth of our squad and its quality can be our ace cards in this particular game.There is no need to be insecure about our place here, the Champions League this season has been an incredible competition for Chelsea, with only one defeat and even that was a bit weird with Porto’s last-minute wonder goal when we had again shown great maturity to see the game out up until then.The wins against Sevilla and Atletico Madrid in the Champions League already this season must also give our players a huge boost, almost as much as the incredible defensive record we have had since Thomas Tuchel arrived. The boss will have gone through our plans from A to Z and now it is just about implementing them on the night. Do that and I truly believe we have a great chance of getting to Istanbul.