Man of the Match: Galatasary & Fulham

Not a difficult choice this week per se, for Man of the Match, complicated slightly by the fact that we are covering two matches.

The stand out performer against Galatasary was Azpilicueta who had bags of energy all night as well as being defensively sound and his opportunistic tackle, forward run and well judged pull back for the goal needs little fanfare. Torres had one of his more involved games as Chelsea’s ultra-counter attacking display suited his game a little more. Scored one with a neat finish, but could and perhaps should have had one or two more. Arguably it was Sir Frank Lampard’s best defensive display of the season, the veteran covered runs and made tackles, notably so with one perfectly timed sliding challenge in his own penalty area. And Brana continued his recent run of good form with some robust defending. But for his overall performance an din setting up the goal, Azpi get’s our nomination.

For the Fulham game it is difficult to look beyond Eden Hazard and Andre Schurrle, so we won’t! Hazard was Chelsea’s best forward-minded player in the first half, had an electric spell in the second when he ran Fulham ragged from all angles and played Schurrle in for his first two goals with quality assists. Schurrle came to life in the second half with a performance full of endless and clever running (from deep after a give and go for his first goal, along the line for his second and opportunistically to complete his hat trick) that brought him three goals with good finishing with both feet. He had a shcoker first half mind and many were calling for him to be hooked. But I guess that’s why Jose is Chelsea manager and not us!

Honourable mentions should also go to Nemanja Matic for another assured display, Matic was asked to sit deeper than usual. Shielded his back four well and kept play moving with simple passes, and Gary Cahill and John Terry. Their partnership is on another level these days. Only an early Clint Dempsey header wide with no one picking him up blotted their copy book. Darren Bent never had a sniff.

Here’s what the boys had to say on the Chelsea FanCast

Don’t forget to tune in at 19.00-21.00 GMT every Monday for the Chelsea FanCast on sportstonightlive.com, mixlr.com or watch live here to see the results of the poll!

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