Aston Villa 1 - Chelsea 2Aston Villa: Jores Okore 48
Chelsea: Eden Hazard 8 Branislav Ivanovic 66
It ended with Chelsea moving seven points clear at the top of the Premier League and maybe even the semblance of a smile from the man who came back to English football insisting he wanted to be known as the Happy One. José Mourinho’s scowl has felt like a permanent attachment in recent times but this felt like a significant moment in the Premier League title race and it was not straightforward seeing off an Aston Villa side that had at least paid attention to the photograph of an empty goal splashed across the front of the Birmingham Mail. “Memo to Villa,” it read. “This is what a goal looks like.”
Paul Lambert’s side certainly needed the reminder bearing in mind the moment when Jores Okore headed in Carles Gil’s cross to make it 1-1, three minutes into the second half, brought up the 11-hour mark since their last top-division goal 43 days earlier. So, hallelujah, Villa have finally managed to equal the number of league goals Bournemouth have scored in Birmingham this season.
Unfortunately for Villa, there have still been only two occasions all season when they have scored twice in a league game and Chelsea had enough time and self-belief to restore their winning position through Branislav Ivanovic’s decisive strike.
Ivanovic is establishing himself as the ultimate odd job man – a full-back, centre-half, attacker, motivator and goalscorer all wrapped into one – and this was his fifth goal in his last six starts against Villa. There was still a third of the match to play but Villa had resorted to type and Christian Benteke’s introduction, having been dropped from Lambert’s starting XI, had little impact.
Mourinho brought on Juan Cuadrado, the £23m acquisition from Fiorentina, during those moments and Manchester City’s inability to beat Hull City at their own ground ultimately made it a hugely satisfying win for the leaders. True, they might have made easier work of it bearing in mind Eden Hazard opened the scoring with a superbly worked team goal after only eight minutes. They did, however, show title-winning qualities in their response to Villa’s first league goal in 2015 and, on the balance of play, they were clearly the better side.
Mourinho tried to argue that seven points amounted to “nothing” in a league where “nothing surprises me”. They missed Diego Costa at times and it was a difficult day for Didier Drogba, a month short of his 37th birthday and struggling to remind us of the player of old, barring those moments when he was flinging himself to the ground in pretend agony.
Yet Mourinho was twirling his hand in the air after the final whistle and his celebrations indicated he knew what an important victory this might be.
Early on, it had looked like it would be a much more routine win when Drogba played the ball forward and Oscar, running through the inside-right channel, eluded Okore then played it inside for Willian. Hazard had anticipated the next pass, darting in front of Alan Hutton, and Willian delivered it with just the right amount of weight for his team-mate to turn a first-time shot past Brad Guzan.
The frustration inside Villa Park manifested itself in some voluble dissent aimed towards Tom Cleverley. Lambert could be seen taking exception to something that Rui Faria, Mourinho’s assistant, had said in the opposite dugout and was suspicious to learn that the Chelsea manager had described Villa’s squad as “one of the best” in the country, with a “very good bench and lots of solutions”. There is history here and Lambert, with two wins in 20 league games since signing his new contract, did not appreciate the flattery. “That’s his opinion,” he said. “Maybe he is trying to put pressure on me.”
If nothing else, Mourinho was guilty of serious exaggeration, especially given the way Willian, Oscar and Hazard endangered the home defence. Villa’s scoring drought had gone on so long there were supporters holding up posters with arrows to show the way to goal. Gil, a £3.2m signing from Valencia, looks like he might be a bargain and it was a beautiful little drop of the shoulder to fool Oscar before his cross picked out Okore at the back post.
Unfortunately for Villa, Lambert’s players could not follow the crowd’s instructions again. Chelsea found some new impetus and when César Azpilicueta’s perseverance created the chance for Ivanovic he let fly with a left-foot shot that was still rising as it flew into the net.
Guardian
