Well, at least Chelsea actually has a competent attack this season. Chelsea utterly dominated Liverpool for large stretches of the pair’s season opener and nearly came out with a victory, yet their goal scoring woes once again came back to haunt them.
Chelsea fans really are paying the price for Roman Abramovich’s dominating success.
Despite having a fantastic performance that saw them dominate huge parts of their opener against Liverpool, the Blues could only manage a draw as they once again couldn’t score a goal even if their lives depended on it. And, to be honest, it’s actually comical how poor Chelsea’s finishing truly is.
So, this was easily the match of the weekend to date as both sides showed their title-challenging potential…while both showed why they are destined to fail in their quests for the title. Liverpool came out swinging and firing on all cylinders as their cohesion and past success with the players that still remain, such as the front three and defense, helped them break through Chelsea’s disjointed, untested banks of newly acquired players (5 players in Chelsea’s starting lineup were not even on the roster last season.)
Now, Chelsea did eventually grow a little more confident and secure in on another’s positioning on the field as the game went on, but those opening 20-30 minutes were pretty brutal to watch for Chelsea fans as Cody Gakpo, Diogo Jota, Luis Diaz, and Mo Salah ran rampant on the Chelsea backline of Thiago Silva, Levi Colwill, Ben Chilwell, Reece James, and Axel Diasi.
In fact, I’d say the goal of the week was also seen in this match as Mo Salah’s brilliant take-on of Colwill outside of the Chelsea box and then pinpointing a brilliant cross through Chelsea’s entire backline to start off the scoring through Luis Diaz. And Mo Salah added an offside strike ten minutes after Diaz’ 17th minute goal to go up 2-0…for all of two minutes before it was called back. Along with a few half-chances, Liverpool were really putting a lot of pressure on Robert Sanchez’s goal for that opening stretch.
But that was the end of Liverpool’s domination for Chelsea FINALLY got their act together and took the fight to Liverpool.
Drawing level in the 38th minute through Axel Disasi’s debut goal for Chelsea, the Blues instantly scored a second goal through Enzo Fernandez slipping a pass through the Liverpool defense and sending Ben Chilwell in on Alisson’s goal, which he easily rounded past the keeper and sent Chelsea up 2-1…or so everyone in Stamford Bridge thought.
Just like Mo Salah’s offside strike, Chilwell had ventured marginally offside, and the goal was swiftly taken off the board to the delight of the Liverpool defense as they got absolutely caught out in those two minutes. I know Liverpool improved their midfield (or so they say) through the signings of Alexis MacAllister and Dominik Szoboszlai, yet the defense that gave up so many silly goals last season is pretty much the same.
Actually, it’s completely the same as Trent Alexander-Arnold (who played pretty well today), Virgil Van Dijk, Ibrahima Konate, Andy Robertson, and Alisson all started today, while Joe Gomez and Joel Matip again sat as the reserves on the bench. I really think Liverpool’s defense is going to prove to be their Achillies heal this season as they really should have been punished for Chilwell’s goal, and then they barely survived the second half.
Chelsea ended up dominating every statistical aspect of the game as they finished with 65% possession, 10 shots on goal, 4 shots on target (Liverpool had 1), 692 completed passes (Liverpool only had 371), and 87% passing accuracy (Liverpool had 79%). It truly was a massacre in the second half as Liverpool was holding on to survive with their point, but they did so in the end.
We’ll have to wait and see how these two sides play out across the rest of the season, but at least they put on a good show for us.
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