Key events
Here’s Conor Gallagher. “We’re gutted, really,” he says. “Poor first half, but lethargic. The gaffer, long story short, just told us to liven up and work harder. Second half was much better, we showed great character. The goal at the end should have counted, not my decision. Very happy with the goal, absolute swinger.”
Two goals per side, and two quite different halves. Villa controlled the first without having much of the ball. Chelsea bossed the second, while still allowing the odd chance, and they had a goal disallowed in each half. It could easily have been 4-4.
FULL TIME! Villa 2-2 Chelsea
And that’s that.
90+9 min Chance for Villa! Duran, with a header from a corner – over the bar.
90+9 min Before that, Palmer had a big chance – he picked Villa’s pocket as they played out from the back, worked the space well, but his shot was saved by Olsen.
DISALLOWED! Villa 2-2 Chelsea
The ref goes to the monitor and chalks the goal off.
Hang on!
The ball came back in after a corner, and Disasi was alert and got the header in off the underside of the bar. But there had been a shove in the back in the build-up…
GOALL!!!! Villa 2-3 Chelsea (Disasi 90+5)
They’ve done it!
90+2 min Gallagher and Palmer, the brains trust of this young Chelsea team, stand over a free kick. Gallagher takes it, then has a follow-up shot blocked. Palmer picks the ball up on the left wing but can’t do much with it.
90+1 min There will be at least six more minutes. Plenty of time for a winner.
90 min At last, a Chelsea sub, in fact two. Thiago Silva off, limping; Disasi on. Casadei also on, for Mudryk I think.
89 min Not long ago I was noting that it was 11-5 to Chelsea on shots. Now it’s 19-8.
88 min Big chance for Villa! A cross comes in from the right to the penalty spot, where Watkins has plenty of time to get the shot away – and he blasts it over the bar.
87 min McGinn breaks away with the ball, though without anyone to pass to. Thiago Silva helps him out by fouling him and picks up a yellow card.
86 min Villa almost escape, but then Chelsea surround the ball and win it back. They now have a corner.
83 min Another Villa sub: Duran comes on to replace Diaby, who has now been subbed on and off in the same game. In terms of subs, this game is not so close: Villa 4, Chelsea 0.
82 min Villa may have a back five but none of them got stuck into Gallagher. He danced along the edge of the box, thought he might as well shoot, and hit the ball beautifully – left foot, top bin. He was helped by a good little run off the ball from someone, Palmer I suspect.
GOAL!!! Villa 2-2 Chelsea (Gallagher 81)
This is a peach.
79 min Jackson, slipped in by Madueke, blows a good position with a heavy first touch.
77 min Villa seem to have switched to a back five, but Chelsea are still looking dangerous. They pile forward again and Cucurella tees up Palmer, whose shot from the D is just wide.
74 min Villa waste a corner. Time for some subs from Unai Emery: Leon Bailey and Douglas Luiz off, Tim Iroegbunam and Diego Carlos on.
73 min Then Villa get upfield, with Watkins almost getting the chance he has been waiting for – but the ball refuses to fall kindly for him.
71 min Another chance for Madueke! Caicedo, nixing fire with finesse, pulls off a fine sliding tackle and then plays a dink through to Madueke, whose left-foot poke is batted away by Olsen.
67 min Villa could do with a lull and they get one as Digne needs some treatment. “It’s chalk and cheese, it really is,” says Joe Cole about Chelsea in this half, as compared with the first. “They’ve started on absolute fire.”
66 min Bailey goes into the boxok for stepping on Caicedo’s foot. Another free kick to Chelsea.
65 min Palmer hits a skimmer, wide of Olsen’s left-hand post. The crowd are getting agitated and they’re right to be.
65 min And now Madueke charges forward and wins a free kick in the D.
63 min The goal was made by Gallagher, with his buzzy pressing. He slipped in Madueke, who found the precision Chelsea had been lacking and steered a low shot into the far corner with his left foot as if his name was Cole.
GOAL! Villa 2-1 Chelsea (Madueke 63)
Back in it!
62 min Gallagher tests Olsen with a chipped cross. He comes and gets it, bravely, but then …
61 min Cometh the hour, cometh the man? Not just yet, but Palmer is getting on the ball more.
