Chelsea began the game pretty well and created a few half-decent chances in the first 15-20 minutes — Neto, Enzo, Cucurella all could’ve perhaps done a bit better with their finishing — before the sucker punch duly arrived, and Bayern were suddenly up 2-0.
First, a free kick that turned into a drop ball thanks to referee interference lulled Chelsea into inattention, and Michael Olise’s cross bounced in off the knee of Trevoh Chalobah. Olise was generally well marshalled by Cucurella (relatively speaking),
at least in the first half, but this time he only had to contend with Joao Pedro, and that was a big(er) mismatch.
Then, not five minutes later, a turnover at the back and an ill-advised, all-or-nothing tackle in the area gifted Bayern a second goal, with Harry Kane making no mistake from the spot.
Chelsea threatened to crumble, but instead Cole Palmer led and finished a surgical counter to cut the deficit in half barely a minute later. The match exploded to life at that point, and both sides could’ve added more goals, but we’d head into half time at 2-1.
Chelsea came out with great energy from the break, but the final ball would elude us. And then Bayern decided they had enough, and only the hands of Bob prevented them from scoring a couple. But not even Sanchez could stop Kane collecting another gift from another turnover at the back, and making it 3-1 with a precise finish just past the hour-mark.
Crestfallen, Chelsea were not able to mount another comeback and the only question seemed to be whether Bayern would make this a more lopsided scoreline. They didn’t and Palmer even had the ball in the back of the net late on, but he was offside by a leg.
Carefree.
- Injury to Colwill aside, same lineup as in the Club World Cup final. Not quite the same outcome!
- The unbeaten streak is over at 20 games in all competitions; time to start another one!
- Next up: Manchester United away, on Saturday evening
- KTBFFH
