Chelsea munch West Bromley 6-0 in premier league rout
Didier Drogba went for the kill
Six goals, a hat-trick from Didier Drogba and immediately back on top of the league.
As a statement of intent, this was so emphatic that some bookmakers are already quoting odds on Chelsea remaining at the summit of the Premier League all the way until May.
After ending last season with respective 8-0 and 7-0 home thrashings of Wigan and Stoke, there was also a certain symmetry about beginning this campaign with a 6-0 thumping of West Bromwich Albion. Most ominously, Ancelotti believes his World Cup players remain around two weeks short of optimum fitness.
“This is a message for us because we had a difficult pre-season but now everything has come back to be OK,” he said. “We did our job, nothing special. The squad is complete.”
Reports that the players will be denied their usual win bonuses this season as part of a cost-cutting measure certainly had no tangible impact on the collective motivation. “To watch how they played, I think they are very happy,” Ancelotti said.
Yet Chelsea also continue to win football matches rather more easily than new friends. Having won the Double last season, Terry bullishly declared in his programme notes that a repeat of the most successful season in the club’s history was the “minimum” aim for this campaign.
Chairman Bruce Buck was even more daring in deciding to answer Joe Cole’s declaration that, in Liverpool, he was joining the biggest club in England. “Joe Cole has gone to a smallish club somewhere north of the M25,” he wrote.
Aside from the attempted humour, the more interesting point is the way Chelsea have seamlessly continued their form of last season despite the departures of Cole and four other senior players.
With Michael Essien again driving his team forward following knee ligament surgery, they were ahead within six minutes after Malouda was upended on the edge of the penalty area to present Drogba with a first sight of goal.
His free-kick was spilled by Scott Carson, with the rebound pounced upon by John Obi Mikel, who hooked the ball across the penalty area for Malouda to finish.
Roberto di Matteo, the West Brom manager, had been enthusiastically welcomed back to Stamford Bridge but could hardly have looked more depressed at the way the match had started. His team had clearly come with the principal objective of frustrating Chelsea by getting men behind the ball, but the early goal ensured there would have to be rather more adventure from his players, leaving space for Chelsea.
The second goal came from another free-kick. Drogba had looked too far from goal to offer any major danger, but his shot somehow went through the West Brom wall and then inside Carson’s near-post.
West Brom had not scored a league goal at Stamford Bridge since 1988 and offered only a sporadic threat before Drogba further extended Chelsea’s lead in the 56th minute from yet another set piece. Terry and Anelka had efforts blocked before Drogba scrambled the ball past Carson.
As well as Drogba, Lampard also continued his remarkable goal-scoring of last season by wrong-footing Carson after more excellent work from Malouda. Drogba’s long-range shot then took a cruel deflection off Gabriel Tamas and past Carson, with the rout completed when Malouda placed Anelka’s through-ball in off the post.
Source: Telegraph
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