Chelsea Vs. Wigan Athletic: Player Ratings

Petr Cech had a relatively quiet game. For all that Chelsea were 'outplayed' over the course of the win, Cech didn't have a whole lot to do apart from punt the ball forward following silly backwards passes. Could do nothing about Mohamed Diame's goal in the 82nd minute - that shot barely gave him enough time to move - and his distribuution suits Didier Drogba far more than it does Fernando Torres, meaning his pass completion percentage went way up through basically no fault of his own. Would be nice to have Chelsea focus on building up from the back, of course, but it doesn't look like we're going down that route anytime soon.

Ryan Bertrand did not look like a man making his first Premier League start. He wasn't spectacular, but we've had a spectacular display from left back about twice in the past two years, so expectations weren't nearly that high for the 22-year-old. Here's what we were hoping for - a decent defensive shift against a fairly weak team and some good crossing with Didier Drogba in the box. We got both, with some reasonable assured defensive work and a couple of good crosses. I'd ignore the minor error on Diame's goal, because a) despite it resulting in a goal, it took a monstrous hit for Wigan to score and b) Bertrand shouldn't be expected to shut down the middle anyway. One of the midfielders should have picked up Diame long before he skipped past Bertrand.

We had a bizarre performance from David Luiz in midweek, a return to the bad old days where his over-confidence on the ball got him into trouble. I'd guess Roberto di Matteo said something to him after that, because this was a no-nonsense display from the centre back. David Luiz racked up the most interceptions on the team, with partner Gary Cahill doing most of the tackling, but there were no major mistakes from the Brazilian in an assured display, and his long-passing was fairly reasonable as well.

Looked slightly less comfortable than partner David Luiz, although that may simply be his style. Cahill played his part in defending Cech's goal - he was Chelsea's main aerial presence and tackler, and I can't remember any instance in which I was particularly disappointed in his defending. In truth, the moment that most seared into my mind regarding Cahill's game was a 35-yard-shot which forced Ali Al-Habsi into a flying save, which says... well, I don't know what it says. Yesterday was weird. Oh, and apparently his passing was great.

After scoring a pair of vital goals against Aston Villa last weekend, Ivanovic added to his tally with the opener against Wigan. Sure, it was offside, and he probably should have left the ball for David Luiz, but it was a key goal nonetheless and besides, he won the free kick that led to it in the first place. Ivanovic then blocked a certain Wigan goal all of thirty seconds later. Otherwise, it was a pretty quiet game from the Serbian, although he at least managed to avoid being torn to shreds on the right this time. With Drogba playing, Ivanovic should probably have been crossing more, especially considering how high up the pitch he ended up. Overall, a mediocre performance punctuated with one brilliant minute.

Meireles was rewarded for his last-minute goal against Benfica with a start in the pivot, and he wasn't awful here. Perhaps I'm just comparing him to his midfield partner, who was legitimately poor, but Meireles had a decent game, controlling the centre without a problem, putting in a few important (and a few mistimed) tackles, rarely losing the ball, and getting an assist for the first goal. I know he's not the best midfielder we have, and his presence didn't help much when Wigan made that late surge, but when we expect to control the match we could do worse than Meireles in the central pairing.

Yikes. Essien looked off the pace all match and was mercifully yanked for John Obi Mikel with 15 minutes to go. His passing was off, his positioning was poor and his tackling earned him a yellow card and probably could have been punished further. When he came back under Andre Villas-Boas, Essien was often one of the best players on the team. Since, he's been nowhere near it, and it's a worrying trend. Either he's rusty, which is fine, or he's broken, which is a terrifying prospect. We should give him until the end of the year to figure it out, but yesterday's match was a deeply unhappy one for the Ghanaian.

Looking at the numbers, I'm acually astonished that Malouda only failed to complete five of his thirty passes, because it felt like we watched him break up attacks by giving the ball away for virtually the entirety of the first half. Plusses: That one cross was kind of good. Minuses: Slow and ponderous, sloppy passing, didn't give Ryan Bertrand much help, awful. After getting on Kalou's case for a 'poor' showing against Benfica, the fans probably needed a demonstration of what actual left-wing badness was all about.

A good enough performance from Mata that eventually ended up with the little midfielder accidentally scoring the game winning goal two minutes from time, which I think we'd all take. Mata played well in the hole, but with Chelsea struggling to penetrate the massed Wigan defence, Mata needed to be the guy to open the door and he couldn't quite manage it. That's no shame, of course - Chelsea shouldn't be relying on one guy to do everything anyway. Hopefully they give him a rest for the Fulham match. Oh, and he really should have scored in the first half.

Let's start with the bad: Sturridge barely got himself involved in the attack and failed to support Branislav Ivanovic in defence either. His passing was weak, his shooting was way off, and the one time he really had the opportunity to cut Wigan open he ended up going for glory from a stupid angle and predictably messing it all up. On the other hand, his off-ball movement was pretty good, and if his teammates had been better at picking him out he'd probably have scored at least once. That's fine and all, but he really needs to work on his all-around game. Disappointing.

An interesting game from the Ivorian, who was mostly quiet but popped up with some very important pieces of play every now and then. He might have scored twice in the first half, fed Sturridge for his lone chance, made a mess of a one-on-one against Ali Al-Habsi in the second, and eventually set up Torres for Mata's winner. It's difficult to gauge Drogba's performance as a result - do you penalise him for the long stretches in which he didn't do much of anything, or give him credit for ultimately having a major influence on the match? I ended up giving him the benefit of the doubt.

Fernando Torres had as many touches against Wigan Athletic as he did against Benfica in about a third of the total minutes. Playing right wing after Florent Malouda was pulled, Torres got himself in great positions several times and really did an excellent job against Emmerson Boyce. If he hadn't been falling over so often the game probably would have been put out of reach long before Diame's equaliser, but he made up for his myriad slips with a wonderful shot off Drogba's cross right at the end, getting a woodwork assist on Mata's goal. Not too bad at all, but I'm still not sure he's the answer at right wing. And those slips were really, really annoying.

Chelsea were being overrun in the centre of the park by the time John Obi Mikel came on for Michael Essien, making his introduction a fairly obvious move. Unfortunately, it didn't really do much of anything, as Mikel was largely bypassed in the frenzy. He had a couple of good moments defensively but wasn't able to prevent Wigan applying more and more pressure and eventually equalising. Since doing so was the whole point of Mikel being on the pitch, it's hard to be too kind to him in the ratings.

Replaced Sturridge and then did exactly what Sturridge was doing in the whole match, with the added ponus of passing. His lone shot, which hit the side netting when Chelsea desperately needed him to do something more useful with the ball, was embarrassing, but at least he managed to stretch the play fairly effectively.