adminChelsea’s away form had been giving them cause for concern but they put it right in the most emphatic fashion, moving five points clear at the top of the Premier League by inflicting on Swansea one of their worst defeats since they arrived at elite level in 2011. Only Liverpool had previously scored five against them.The outcome was settled before half-time, by which stage Chelsea led 4-0, with their fans chanting the name of Diego Costa, whose two goals took his personal contribution to 17 in 19 league appearances.
The capacity crowd were still pondering the team changes when Chelsea took the lead, with just 50 seconds played. A pass from Gylfi Sigurdsson failed to find its target, enabling Oscar to run on through the middle before letting fly from the edge of the D with a shot that arrowed past Lukasz Fabianski’s right hand.
In what was a frenetic start, the Swans were desperately close to equalising after two minutes, when Sigurdsson’s 25-yarder hit the top of Petr Cech’s right post with the goalkeeper beaten. Cech retained his place, despite the fact that Thibaut Courtois was fit again and on the bench.
Swansea gave a first start to Nelson Oliveira, signed on loan from Benfica to compensate for Wilfried Bony’s departure. It was an occasion he will want to forget.
Unsurprisingly the league leaders were the better, more cohesive unit and they deservedly doubled the lead in the 20th minute, when neat inter-passing between Cesc Fàbregas and Willian fashioned the opportunity for Costa to score with a confident finish from near the penalty spot.
It might have been 3-0 in the 29th minute, when Willian shivered Fabianski’s left post with a pulverising shot, but Chelsea’s third was delayed for only five minutes.
Then a dreadful back-pass from Frederico Fernández out on the right presented possession to Costa, who finished with predatory precision, from left to right. The roof was falling in on Swansea and two minutes later it was 4-0, Oscar driving home from 18 yards after receiving an inviting centre from Costa.
Before half-time Willian smacked a shot against the crossbar after a break out by Costa and the interval found Garry Monk and his team very much in damage limitation mode.
They were fortunate that with the game won, Chelsea took it easy in the second half, with one eye on Tuesday’s Capital One Cup semi-final against Liverpool and contented themselves with just one more goal, side-footed in at close range by the substitute André Schürrle. — The Guardian
Yesterday’s Results
Tottenham 2-1 Sunderland
Leicester City 0-1 Stoke City
Burnley FC 2-3 Crystal Palace
Swansea City 0-5 Chelsea
Aston Villa 0-2 Liverpool
QPR 0-2 Man United
Newcastle 1-2 Southampton
Playing Today
West Ham v Hull City 3:30pm
Man City v Arsenal 6:00pm
Paying Tommorow
Everton v West Brom 10:00pm
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