The Man in The Shed

12^th April – Czech, mate

So another Thursday night and another away Europa League match for The Blues.

As I settled down to the preamble that precedes every live game I wondered what the researchers would come up with tonight. Well, the Chelsea link between the teams this time was fairly tenuous – one of the army of players that stepped through the revolving doors of the Cobham training ground was doing quite well for Slavia Prague. One Miroslav Stoch, a Slovakian and veteran of five games (no goals) for The Blues ten years ago. It seemed he’d developed quite well and was playing in the top club in the Czech league - recent conquerors of the Europa league’s equivalent of Real Madrid, Sevilla (five UEFA cup / Europa league titles). It was being painted as a tough tie.

With the games coming thick and fast there was plenty of squad rotation; plus the added bonus of Liverpool away on Sunday ! We welcomed back Pedro, Willian, Giroud, Kovacic, Barkley, Alonso and Christensen.

Most of the first fifteen minutes was all Prague. With the crowd right behind them and a high pressing game they definitely had us on the back foot. At which point I was trying to establish what a partial ground closure (they were supposed to have had one imposed) actually meant. It took a while to realise that it was less than one end of the ground – not much of a punishment then in terms of damaging the atmosphere.

Despite the pressure and the lack of cohesion from our team it took them 20 minutes to register a shot on target. Alonso managed to deflect a block into the face of the lino – he didn’t look happy and I was seriously hoping that he didn’t bear a grudge.

Finally we managed to impose ourselves and Willian hits the bar with our first real attack. It seemed as if we couldn’t string two passes together and then up pops a stat to say we’d had 56% of the possession in the first half an hour – really ?

We were slowly edging back into the game but it was requiring lots of great defensive work by the whole team to keep these opponents at bay. It did seem a bit unfair that unhappy at being dropped, David Luiz had managed to sneak on in a red and white shirt to stay involved.

Half time couldn’t come too soon. Another inspiring away team talk was required.

My half time refreshment break was disappointingly disrupted by news of (another) shameful fan incident. Yet more idiots behaving with the intellect of Neanderthals. The only positive seemed to be that the club had broken a speed record in order to ban them before they could even enter the ground.  Nice one.

It took us fifty minutes to manage our first corner. The team seemed all out of sorts with the likes of Pedro and Alonso really not up to standard. The question was how long would Sarri wait before wielding the axe. Not long – Pedro off for Hazard before the hour was up.

This action seemed to galvanise the whole team. Merely having a genius on the pitch seems to work wonders. Finally we were on the front foot. A Rűdiger shot saved, a Willian shot from an angle just wide.

Then, with us pressing for a goal we get caught on the counter. Kepa makes the save to keep it all square. Then almost straight afterwards he flaps at a cross. We’re doing better going forward but now looking shakier at the back.

More subs to refresh the midfield which had seemed overrun – Kanté for Kovacic and Loftus-Cheek for Barkley. We manage a (disallowed) goal but then Kepa flaps again before an immediate recovery to make another good save. From being frustrated I’m now worried. 

We’re 80 minutes in and we’ve had one shot on target (to their three). It hadn’t been a dirty game and took until the last ten minutes for the first booking – inevitably for a foul on Hazard.

I’m thinking now that a draw would be a good result. But then probably our best offensive player, Willian, puts over a great cross and Alonso atones for his poor display with a great headed goal.

Before you know it time is up and we’d won !

The game won’t live long in the memory but it did prove that we could play badly and still win. OK, it would have been nicer to have kept Hazard and Kanté benched / rested for the whole game but we got the job done again.

Yet another big shout out for Rűdiger too. He continues to deliver a consistently high level of performance and had two good chances to score.

A short break of three days (again) and it is back to the League. Liverpool away. This will be a tough one.