Easy, peasy, lemon squeezy.
Goals from Pedro, Zappacosta, Azpilicueta were more than enough to get Chelsea the three Champions League points tonight against Qarabag, who posed very little threat throughout. It took Chelsea just five minutes to open the scoring, and the Blues never looked back from there. Bakayoko and Batshuayi added three more for good measure, Bats with the late brace to truly reflect Chelsea’s dominance in the game. (Michy’s second was later ruled an own goal from Medvedev.)
Carefree.
- Elsewhere in the group, Roma and Atletico battled to a 0-0 draw, which is just about the best result for Chelsea.
- Five changes made by Conte from the weekend, with the only real surprise being the non-inclusion of Charly Musonda even on the bench. So instead of giving some “meaningless” minutes to him or other youngsters, our second half subs, while up 3-0, were Hazard (for Pedro) and Bakayoko (for Kante) and Rudiger (for Azpilicueta). I wouldn’t call that ideal, but it is what it is. Good to see Kante & Azpi getting a bit of a rest.
- Kante makes his CL debut after purposefully delaying 12 months by switching to Chelsea last summer.
- First start for Zappacosta, first goal for Chelsea
- First goal for Chelsea for Bakayoko
- An easy win, just as expected and hoped for
- Bring on the Arsenal, on Sunday
- KTBFFH
FB LIVE: Post-match “live” at 9am-ish BST tomorrow morning.