Everton struck early, but Frank Lampard leveled the game late in the first half

Well the first 40 minutes of this game pretty much sucked. Ashley Cole might as well not be on the pitch, he's been caught somewhere between an area where he can be useful defensively and an area where he can contribute anything to the attack. Fernando Torres has stopped making any sort of useful runs. None of Chelsea's attacking band seem to feel the need to push beyond the edge of the 18-yard box.

Luckily for Chelsea, a pair of excellent Petr Cech saves and the post kept the Blues from being down 4-0 just 35 minutes into the game. Then Ramires found Frank Lampard, and all of a sudden it was 1-1.

Chelsea should feel fortunate to be level at the break, as they've been second best today by a pretty wide margin. They still have 45 minutes to improve, and they really need to do so if they want to take anything from this game. Hopefully they do so, as I was really hoping to see a halfway decent game today.