Date: 3rd December 2018 at 4:06pm
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A Blue Up North reviews Chelsea’s home victory over Fulham.

The early kick off this Sunday saw Chelsea host their SW6 neighbours Fulham at Stamford Bridge. A home match against bottom of the league would normally have been the perfect tie to follow their first defeat of the season, but this wasn’t the same Fulham side who have slipped to 20th place in the Premier League.

After registering their 7th league loss in succession on 11 November, Slavisa Jokanovic was sacked as Fulham’s manager and replaced by former Blues’s boss Claudio Ranieri. And the new manager syndrome struck straight away as they beat Southampton last weekend to register their first 3 points since August.

Despite being given The Tinkerman nickname whilst at Chelsea, Ranieri would have wanted to name the same side that won his first match with Fulham, but former Blue Andre Schurrle was injured in training and replaced by Johansen.

Maurizio Sarri had some big decisions to make with regards to his starting line up. After the humiliating loss to Tottenham Hotspur last weekend and his first choice team putting in such a poor performance. Possibly the biggest surprise was that he kept with the same defence and midfield that started in their first loss of the season. With the memories of Spurs easily finding space to slice through The Blues still so fresh in the mind, Sarri only made changes in the front 3. Olivier Giroud and Pedro replaced Alvaro Morata and Willian.

One of Sarri’s comments after last weekend’s defeat was his disappointment that his side seem to be starting matches too slow. Thanks to the incredible talents of N’Golo Kante this wasn’t the case against Fulham. The Frenchman pickpocketed the ball from Seri and his pass released Pedro to finish delightfully inside the first 4 minutes. This strike was Chelsea’s 1,000th Premier League goal scored at home.

Fulham now remain the only side in the top four tiers of English football yet to keep a clean sheet in the league this season and a few weeks ago this match may have ended in a heavy defeat for The Cottagers. Although, The Blues continued to dominate most of the first half, the visitors kept themselves in the match as Sergio Rico twice denied Olivier Giroud.

However, at half time, Ranieri introduced  Ayité and Kamara as he shuffled his pack and changed their system. The changes made a difference. As The Blues struggled to maintain a smooth rhythm, The Cottagers threatened to find an equaliser. Kepa Arrizabalaga was more than good enough to earn his clean sheet and after substitute Morata was unable to convert a good chance it fell to fellow sub Ruben Loftus-Cheek to put the match beyond the hard working Fulham side.

The goal sealed an excellent week for the young Englishman. A goal and a man of the match performance against PAOK Salonika on Thursday was then topped off with an important cameo appearance and a match winning goal against Fulham. The signs are there that Loftus-Cheek is now becoming more than just a big physical presence on the pitch. Add to that some footballing intelligence and you end up with an influential player with an end product. This was his 5th goal in 6 appearances and we can expect him to be involved regularly during the upcoming weeks as The Blues play back to back twice a week in to the new year.

So a week that had started with a whole lot of question marks over Sarri and his team ended with 2 victories, 2 clean sheets and a number of answers. Defensively our midfield looked much tighter with Kante lying slightly deeper in support of Jorginho and this allowed Antonio Rudiger and David Luiz to be more resolute. Pedro’s finishing can be vital especially when there is a lack of strikes from our main striker and central midfield. Loftus-Cheek can make a difference to a Premier League match and is a useful impact substitute.

However, Mateo Kovacic, who usually thrives on constantly moving the ball forward, stuttered in possession again which aided the home side’s struggle to apply longer periods of pressure. Marcos Alonso does appear to be affected by opposing fans’s unpleasant abuse aimed at him. How he would have loved to have score and silenced both the Spurs and Fulham sections.

With 8 matches to be played in the month of December, Sarri will delight in the response shown by all of his squad over the last 2 matches and should have more confidence as he rotates his starting line up on a more regular basis. Could this be a start of another 18 match unbeaten run?

Written by Jon Ellis, home and away season ticket holder. Follow him on Twitter @ClitheroeBlue

 

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