Cole Palmer remained on the sidelines for nearly an hour while Chelsea extended their winless streak away from home with a goalless draw against Brentford.
Manager Enzo Maresca surprised many by not including the English forward in the starting eleven, even though his team is fighting for a spot in the Champions League.
Although they have a quarter-final match in the Conference League against Legia Warsaw on Thursday, Maresca's decisions seemed a bit off after a rather uneventful draw.
When Palmer finally entered the game, he couldn't make a difference in breaking the deadlock, missing his only chance by shooting over the crossbar, resulting in what could be considered the most anticipated draw of the season.
Despite Brentford's struggles to secure victories at home and Chelsea's inability to win away in the league since December, one would have expected some action at the Gtech Stadium. Unfortunately, that was not the case.
Brentford were aggressive against Chelsea right from the start, with Bryan Mbeumo and Kevin Schade constantly causing problems for Blues defenders Reece James and Malo Gusto.
Amid the chaos created by Thomas Frank's team, Yoane Wissa had two early opportunities, missing the first one into the side-netting from Mbeumo's cross and having another shot blocked by Trevoh Chalobah.
Gusto received a yellow card for bringing down Schade near the edge of the area, resulting in Mikkel Damsgaard's free-kick just narrowly missing the target.
Damsgaard was then stopped by Robert Sanchez as he made a run through, with the Chelsea goalkeeper making a fantastic save to deny Nathan Collins' header.
Chelsea's only shot on goal in a one-sided first half came from a Noni Madueke strike straight into the hands of Bees goalkeeper Mark Flekken.
Maresca made a substitution at halftime, bringing on Nicolas Jackson instead of Palmer to replace Christopher Nkunku.
In his first three minutes on the field, Jackson showed more than Nkunku did in the previous 45, but his shot missed the target after receiving Enzo Fernandez's pass over the top.
Palmers was brought into the game in the 59th minute, along with Pedro Neto, and the two immediately combined, forcing Flekken to save Neto's shot.
Flekken made an even more impressive save shortly after, deflecting a James header just under the crossbar from a Neto corner.
Brentford gained momentum in the final 10 minutes, with Mbeumo setting up a chance with Wissa, whose shot was too close to Sanchez.
From a corner kick, Bees defender Sepp van den Berg oddly directed a header into the ground and over the crossbar, and Wissa missed another header narrowly as Sanchez scrambled.
In stoppage time, it was Palmer's moment, but he couldn't score, lifting a shot from outside the box over the bar with the final kick of the game.