Match Report: Chelsea force gritty 2-0 away win over tough Burnley team | OneFootball

Chelsea beat Burnley 2-0 with an efficient – if unspectacular – performance at Turf Moor.

As we’ve seen countless times before, it was a slow start from the Blues. A changed up team coming into an early kick off after an international break looked sleepy and sluggish against a Burnley side who were the opposite.

The opening 15 minutes saw the home team break through three times, with three big blocks from Chelsea players denying great chances for the Clarets. Trevoh Chalobah, Andrey Santos and Tosin all had to get in the way of shots to keep their team ahead, a sure sign that the Blues couldn’t find their feet

One major chance the other way saw Liam Delap disappoint everyone by not picking out Jamie Gittens, who had a much better angle to shoot from. Things continued in much the same vein for the rest of the first half – Chelsea looking disjointed, but creating here and there. Delap was involved again when his good link up with Pedro Neto set up Gittens, who had the ball nicked off his toes by Kyle Walker just as he was about to score.

The breakthrough finally came after 36 minutes, with a superb goal which saw Chalobah find Marc Cucurella with a long ball. He played it back to Jamie Gittens, who swung in a superb far post cross for Neto to bury with a diving header.

The second half was more of the same – the Blues now had the lead and Burnley had lost some of their conviction, but the Blues couldn’t create any proper chances, and as the game reached the final ten minutes the tension kept rising.

Finally the increased aggression from the Clarets cost them – they were open at the back and Chelsea were able to sweep forward with another superb team move, finally finished off by Enzo Fernandez.

MOTM – Andrey Santos

Analysis

Enzo Fernandez lashes in against Burnley. (Photo by Nathan Stirk/Getty Images)

Chelsea’s second goal killed the game and made the result look a little more comfortable than it had been. The Blues were really poor in the opening stages, and while their goal was great, it came against the run of play.

The Joao Pedro – Liam Delap combination up front struggled to create much once again, and while it should be remembered that this was a team without key men Cole Palmer and Moises Caicedo, it would also be risky to read too much into this performance.

The real tests come against Arsenal and Barcelona this week, where we find out how far this team has really come.

Teams

Burnley Martin Dúbravka Kyle Walker Quilindschy Hartman Maxime Estève Axel Tuanzebe Lesley Ugochukwu Luís Florentino Loum Tchaouna Zian Flemming Josh Cullen Jaidon Anthony

Substitutes Max Weiss Jacob Bruun Larsen (on 76′) Lyle Foster (on 72′) Marcus Edwards Hjalmar Ekdal Silva Lucas Pires Armando Broja (on 72′) Hannibal Mejbri (on 72′) Josh Laurent (on 84′)

Chelsea Robert Sánchez Reece James Tosin Adarabioyo Trevoh Chalobah Marc Cucurella Enzo Fernández Andrey Santos Pedro Neto João Pedro Jamie Gittens Liam Delap

Substitutes Filip Jørgensen Benoît Badiashile (on 46′) Jorrel Hato Moisés Caicedo Malo Gusto (on 67′) Josh Acheampong Marc Guiu (on 76′) Estêvão Alejandro Garnacho

Stats

Quote of the game

“It can happen. I wake up many times during the night to go to the toilet. I hit my head, my legs, my everything, so it can happen” – Enzo Maresca on Cole Palmer’s stubbed toe.