Who Chelsea will play in Club World Cup last 16 as route to final mapped out

Chelsea, should they qualify for the FIFA Club World Cup round of 16, will take on Benfica on Saturday in Charlotte.

Benfica have just beaten Bayern Munich for the first time in the Portuguese club's history, meaning they have qualified as winners of Group C. Bruno Lage's men will face whoever finishes runners-up in Group D - something that will be decided in Chelsea's final group game against Esperance at the Lincoln Financial Field in Philadelphia.

Chelsea just need to avoid defeat to the Tunisian side in the scorching heat in Pennsylvania in order to progress into the knockout stages of the revamped competition. Flamengo's win against the Blues ensured the Brazilians have won Group D, with the west Londoners' best possible finish now being runners-up.

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Should the Blues then progress into the last eight, then it will be one of Botafogo or Palmeiras. That could be made even more interesting with Estevao Willian, the man who will join Chelsea once his participation in the Club World Cup is over, representing Palmeiras.

Enzo Maresca and his squad have spent over a week in Philadelphia now but the heat is something difficult to get used to. On Monday, the Blues trained in 38 degrees Celsius, and that, to Maresca's own admission, has made the preparation a bit more complicated.

"Tomorrow, we will do some rotation because the ones who played two games are quite tired to play again," Maresca said on Monday. "So we will make rotation, and we will see if there is a chance for those who haven’t played as much."

He continued: "It’s almost impossible to train a full session because of the weather. We are trying to save energy for the game; this morning’s session was very short, just plan for tomorrow, that's it. No more than that.

"It’s not easy with these temperatures, but we will give our best tomorrow to get to the next stage of the competition."

Reece James missed Monday's training session because of illness, meaning the Chelsea captain is now a doubt to take on Esperance. Meanwhile, Nicolas Jackson will serve the first game of his two-match suspension following a straight red card against Flamengo last week.