Nick Ames's match report
Still want more? Well here you are.
Full time: Chelsea 4-2 Watford
That was such an enjoyable game. Both sides deserve enormous credit for their attitude and attacking ability, if not necessarily their defending. Watford will have regrets, particularly those missed opportunities at the start of the second half, but when the dust settles they will be proud of their performance. Chelsea will certainly be proud of the defiance they showed to recover from a quite abysmal start to the second half. By the end, Antonio Conte was back to his infectious, passionate best on the touchline. Thanks for your company, bye!
90+5 min Nobody will accuse Chelsea of lacking cojones after this game.
GOAL! Chelsea 4-2 Watford (Batshuayi 90+5)
Batshuayi seals the win, lobbing Gomes from close range. Britos’ scoop out of defence was headed back towards the area by Bakayoko, and Batshuayi held off Kabasele to lift the ball over Gomes with his ankle.
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90+3 min Hazard kicks the ball away and is not booked, unlike Femenia earlier. I think the referee had his back turned. The Watford players aren’t happy.
90+1 min There will be five minutes of added time.
90 min Watford make their last change, Andre Gray for Mariappa.
88 min The score is a bit harsh on an admirable Watford side. It does, however, show how much resilience Antonio Conte’s teams have, because Chelsea were a shambles for the first first 25 minutes of the second half.
The goal came from another right-wing cross, this time by Willian. It skimmed off the head of the leaping Kabasele at the near post and came to Azpilicueta, who mistimed his header and shouldered the ball into the net!
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GOAL! Chelsea 3-2 Watford (Azpilicueta 87)
Chelsea have won it!
87 min Davide Zappacosta replaces Pedro and almost creates a goal within two seconds with a fine cross that just evades Batshuayi at the near post.
86 min Richarlison and Doucoure work the ball across the box to Femenia, whose deep cross skims the head of the diving Carrillo and flashes well wide. That was another decent opportunity for Watford. Richarlison’s response to those hideous misses has been absolutely outstanding.
82 min Another chance for Batshuayi! Chelsea had a free-kick 40 yards from goal in a central position. Everybody expected a lofted ball to the far post but Fabregas fed a clever pass into the feet of Batshuayi, who shifted the ball to the side of Kiko Femenia and whacked a shot over the bar from 15 yards. Having done the hard part by making space for the shot, he might well have scored.
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81 min In fact Watson has gone into midfield, with Cleverley moving left and Richarlison up front.
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80 min Batshuayi cuts into from the left and curls a fine effort just wide of the far post. Watford make another change, with Ben Watson replacing Troy Deeney. That suggests a switch from 3-4-3 to 3-5-2.
78 min Kiko Femenia is booked for kicking the ball away.
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77 min The game is much more even now, with Chelsea having a lot of the ball.
73 min Chelsea continue to defend like a bunch of amateurs. Cleverley’s curling free-kick to the far post finds the unmarked Kabasele, who heads straight at Courtois from eight yards. That was a poor effort.
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GOAL! Chelsea 2-2 Watford (Batshuayi 71)
The substitute Michy Batshuayi equalises with a superb header! Pedro on the right curled a standard cross towards the near post, where Batshuayi got in front of Britos and flicked a powerful header from 12 yards that beat the desperate dive of Gomes and swirled into the net.
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69 min “Mourinho should manage both Man Utd and Chelsea at the same time,” says Ian Copestake. “He will then be the Rick Wakeman of football, surrounded by banks of keyboards under his Prospero-like control.”
68 min Another Chelsea change: Willian replaces Marcos Alonso, with Azpilicueta moving across to the left.
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67 min “The DVD of Watford’s season will be called ‘Keeping up with the cojones’,” honks Niall Mullen.
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66 min Chelsea played well in the first half but that goal in injury time changed everything and they are a bag of nerves now. Carrillo surges away from Pedro down the right and crosses low towards Richarlison, whose shot deflects behind for a corner.
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65 min A Watford corner is half cleared to Carrillo, who mishits a snapshot from just inside the area. That wasn’t a bad chance.
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65 min The goalscorer Pereyra is limping off with what appears to be a knee injury. Andre Carrillo replaces him.
61 min A Chelsea substitution: Michy Batshuayi replaces Alvaro Morata.
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60 min Hazard has started to get on the ball for the first time since the break. Chelsea need him now.
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59 min “Chelsea’s recent performances (post Atleti) have been reminiscent of 2015-16 minus Mou poisoning the well,” says Chris Ross. “A few more ropey performances and I fear Conte’s for the inevitable exit. If that means Tuchel, I fancy a three-manager season. Or, failing that, a new manager by the start of next season. Richarlson looks fantastic. He’ll soon be taking tumbles in the Champions League.”
With Watford, hopefully #daretodreamyeah
58 min It’s nice to note that Richarlison is still demanding the ball at every opportunity, despite those two horrible misses. Watford have battered Chelsea since half-time; it could easily be 4-1.
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57 min “Don’t blame Richarlison for failing to score,” says Charles Antaki. “It’s well known that he suffers from a vestibular condition which affects his balance, especially when his visual system registers that he’s in the penalty box.”
Charles Antaki may or may be an Arsenal fan. (It was a dive, mind.)
56 min Watford are rampant. Pereyra plays a nice return pass to Deeney, whose stinging shot from the edge of the box is well blocked by David Luiz. Moments later, Morata is booked for a petulant foul on one of the Watford defenders.
54 min Richarlison misses another sitter from six yards! This is crazy. Holebas’s inswinging cross from the right dipped over the head of David Luiz and Richarlison headed well wide of the right-hand post. He may have been unsighted but it looked a great chance, if not quite as good as the first.
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53 min The next goal is huge - not just in this game but in Chelsea’s season. Rudiger, already booked, has a petulant kick at Richarlison. Some referees would have sent him off for that, though I don’t think it was quite enough for a second yellow.
52 min Chelsea are all over the show. This is starting to feel like that infamous Southampton game two years ago.
50 min On reflection, I think Richarlison might have been trying to find Deeney. It doesn’t matter because the ball ran through to Pereyra, who lifted it over Courtois from 10 yards.
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GOAL! Chelsea 1-2 Watford (Pereyra 49)
Richarlison redeems himself with a fine pass across the box to Pereyra, who finishes coolly over Courtois. Watford are ahead!
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49 min Richarlison misses an open goal from six yards! Kiko Femenia surged down the right and put in a beautiful low cross to the far post, where Richarlison got behind Azpilicueta and inexplicably sliced the ball wide with his left foot. How did he not score there?
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47 min It’s been a cracking start to the half. Watford break through Pereyra, whose pass to Deeney in the box is splendidly intercepted by David Luiz.
46 min Chelsea almost score after 32 seconds of the second half. Mariappa, facing his own goal, has no option but to swing his foot at Azpilicueta’s stunning cross and the ball loops onto the roof of the net. Morata was behind him waiting to score.
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46 min Peep peep! Watford begin the second half.
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Shameless plug
This week’s episode of Nessun Dorma, the new 80s and 90s football podcast, includes Neil Ruddock and a bacon sandwich, Sir Alex Ferguson’s traumatic start at Old Trafford and the 1995-96 PFA Team of the Year. What’s not to love? Oh.
Half-time chit-chat
Ian Copestake “With crisis everywhere you look it’s almost as if Premier League football embodies some sort of capitalist model in which crisis is the desired state, where markets change and progress is based on constant adaptation. In short,comrade, all that is solid melts into air.”
Bill Hargreaves “Re Deeney’s comments, I think that he did show some restraint. Keown reported that he’d later, off-air, named people within the Arsenal team whose attitudes he thought didn’t help them, but didn’t want to make these comments public.”
Matt Ballantine “Look forward to the supplement ;o) presumably it’ll be in virtual reality. Btw Watford is definitely not London. It’s in the M25 but it’s outside of the green belt. And of most civilisation.”
Paul Moody “So who will Richarlison play for next year?”
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Half-time reading
Half time: Chelsea 1-1 Watford
Peep peep! That was a really smart finish from Doucoure. There were so many players between him and the goal, so he cut across the ball to swerve it away from all of them and into a tiny gap at the near post.
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GOAL! Chelsea 1-1 Watford (Doucoure 45+3)
Abdoulaye Doucoure equalises on the stroke of half-time! A long throw from Holebas on the right ricocheted around the box and bounced up towards Doucoure, who adjusted his feet smartly to clip a shot with the outside of the right foot that flashed past the unsighted Courtois.
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45+2 min Holebas’s free-kick from the left bounces right across the face of goal, with no Watford player able to stick a boot on it.
44 min “What really is London?” asks Daniel Friedman. “An urban disaster inside the M25? A state of mind? The people served by the tube? From Elland Road everything from Luton to Brighton is London. But what do the people of Watford say?”
43 min A Chelsea goal is coming on the break, if not before half-time then certainly after. Watford are still passing it around nicely but they keep hitting a wall on the edge of the Chelsea area.
41 min “Although all football-related debate has of course been ended by the introduction of goal-line technology and VAR, famously leaving pubs up and down the country devoid of conversation and custom every Saturday and Sunday, I was wondering if you had a take on Troy Deeney’s comments after last week’s match against Arsenal?” says Matt Loten. “Alan Pardew seems to think that Deeney’s inflammatory, distracting, and humiliating assessment of Arsenal’s lack of stomach for the fight were unnecessary and deserving of his manager’s, and the PR department’s, opprobrium. Personally, I think it was a pleasant change to hear a footballer put across an eminently sensible opinion, and come off as very affable human being in the process.”
I didn’t see the incident interview, but generally speaking I really like Deeney. He’s a normal bloke who has a paunch and a great attitude and, as you say, hasn’t been media-trained to within an inch of his personality. He’s a gift from the past.
40 min Hazard moseys around a bit and finds Fabregas, who thwacks a rising drive from 25 yards that is palmed behind by the diving Gomes.
39 min Watford continue to dominate possession, though they haven’t created much. Antonio Conte teams are formidable when they take the lead.
36 min “So will there be the days of media inquest into the dubious corner decision, like there was about the Richarlison penalty last week?” says Matt Ballantine. “Hmm. I’m imagining not.”
Not true. Our sports editor has already commissioned an eight-page supplement on The Ghost Corner of Stamford Bridge.
35 min Fabregas drives a fine long pass to Pedro, who dances around a bit and then makes such a balls of his cross that I wish I hadn’t bothered with this entry.
33 min “I have a question: what on Earth has happened to Eden Hazard?” says Norrie Hernon. “He was just below that perpetual-good-form platform of Messi and Ronaldo - and currently occupied by Mertens and De Bruyne - then kind of went... meh.”
Isn’t he just taking a while to get going after injury? Either that or it’s 2015-16 all over again and he’ll be back to inspire Chelsea to the title next season.
31 min Cleverley does go for the shot and Courtois dives to his right to punch it away. It was a decent effort but a relatively comfortable save.
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30 min The slippery Richarlison is fouled just outside the area by Pedro. The free-kick is just infield from the left edge of the area, but I think Cleverley might go for the shot.
29 min Watford are right in this game. At the moment Doucoure and Cleverley are dominating Bakayoko and Fabregas, while Richarlison is a major threat on the left. Chelsea look very dangerous on the counter-attack though.
28 min A hanging cross from Holebas is superbly headed clear by Cahill, under pressure from three Watford players on the six-yard line.
26 min “Was I the only one irritated by the praise Troy Deeney received for his BT interview last week,” says Niall Mullen. “Essentially he said that Arsenal don’t like it up ‘em & you can find that out by getting stuck in early doors. Apart from being twaddle it’s such a tedious cliché it hurts my brain to hear it.”
25 min “We shouldn’t be surprised Conte is having a season of discontent,” says Hubert O’Hearn. “Correct me if I’m wrong, but since Alex Ferguson has any title-winning manager lasted 18 months at their club after Happy Happy Joy Joy day?”
Pellegrini lasted two more years didn’t he? Mind you, most of those were spent walking while dead. Well done football!
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24 min Pedro, given an intravenous injection of confidence by the goal, tries again from long range. This one isn’t as well struck and bounces a few yards wide of the near post. Gomes probably had it covered.
23 min Another excellent run from Richarlison is ended by a foul from Rudiger, who is booked. Richarlison has been the best player on the pitch so far.
21 min There’s an admirable confidence to Watford’s play. Even away to the champions, there’s no sign of anything resembling an inferiority complex.
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18 min Richarlison is fouled 25 yards from goal from Fabregas, but Holebas’s free-kick from the left is poor and easily clearted. Richarlison looks very lively.
16 min Fabregas misses a great chance to make it 2-0. Hazard led a superb counter-attack and found Morata on the left. He slid a lovely angled pass through the defence to put Fabregas clear on the right of the box. As Gomes came out, Fabregas tried a gentle chip over him. He didn’t get enough on it and Gomes reached up to paw it away. It might not hae gone in anyway, such was the lack of pace on the chip.
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14 min That was such a good goal, although Watford have legitimate cause for complaint: the corner that led to the goal should have been a goalkick. Hazard tried to drag the ball back inside Britos and accidentally backheeled it out of play.
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GOAL! Chelsea 1-0 Watford (Pedro 12)
Pedro gives Chelsea the lead with a belting goal! A right-wing corner was played short to Hazard, who fed a slow pass back to Pedro 25 yards from goal. He hit a big, right-footed curler that swirled onto the inside of the far post and rebounded into the net. Gomes didn’t move.
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11 min “I was a bit gutted about that second Longpigs album,” writes Simon Sylvester. “They were my favourite band, growing up, and my first gig too. Second album was a little flimsy. Sad times. Watford 2-1.”
Me too, though it had its moments, especially the Frank Sonata. The first album set the bar impossibly high.
10 min This is an enjoyable, open game, with Chelsea starting to enjoy their work after a slow start.
8 min Fabregas drives an extremely good 60-yard pass inside Holebas towards Azpilicueta, forcing Holebas to concede a corner. It’s played showed to Pedro, who floats it into the six-yard box, where it bounces off the shin of the unsighted Morata and into the hands of Gomes.
7 min “Watford in London?” sniffs Nathan Eyland. “My geography must be bad, or London moved.”
If it’s on the tube line, it’s in London. At least I assume that’s how my subconscious was thinking when it ushered me towards that geographical howler. Watford is indeed in Hertfordshire.
5 min “Without taking anything away from Watford’s start, might it not be a little premature to say that they have ‘found stability’?” says Shaun Wilkinson. “Given Watford’s recent history and the state of football in general, I would suggest we need to see what happens when they have a bad run before lauding their stability. Leicester looked pretty stable just over a year ago.”
I only said they might have found it, which is surely fair enough based on the obvious brilliance of Marco Silva. I’d be surprised if they ever sack him, put it that way.
3 min Watford have started confidently. Pereyra flicks the ball mischievously around David Luiz, takes the return from Deeney and hits a low cross that is put behind for a corner by Rudiger.
1 min Bakayoko gives the ball away to Deeney, who moves it on to Richarlison. He surges into the box and is expertly slide tackled by Rudiger. Kabasele produces an even better tackle on Morata at the other end. It would have been a goal-saving tackle, had Morata not been flagged offside.
1 min Peep peep! Chelsea kick off from right to left. They are in blue; Watford are wearing their red away kit.
The last time Watford beat Chelsea was September 1999, when the world was eagerly anticipating/panciking about the Blair Witch Project/the Millennium Bug/the new Longpigs album (delete as appropriate). Nice goal, too.
If Watford win today they will be the top London club, for 24 hours at least. I do fancy Chelsea though, maybe 3-1 or 3-0.
Pre-match entertainment
When you thought you'd seen every hilariously bad Graeme Souness tackle for Rangers, there always seems to be one more pic.twitter.com/2KPxV5lpMl
— Adam Hurrey (@FootballCliches) October 16, 2017
Team news
Chelsea (3-4-3) Courtois; Rudiger, David Luiz, Cahill; Azpilicueta, Fabregas, Bakayoko, Alonso; Pedro, Morata, Hazard.
Substitutes: Caballero, Zappacosta, Christensen, Musonda, Willian, Ampadu, Batshuayi.
Watford (3-4-3) Gomes; Mariappa, Kabasele, Britos; Femenia, Cleverley, Doucoure, Holebas; Pereyra, Deeney, Richarlison.
Substitutes: Karnezis, Janmaat, Wague, Capoue, Watson, Gray, Carrillo.
Referee Jon Moss.
Preamble
Hello. Meet Chelsea, a debonair playboy from, erm, Chelsea. No matter how hard he tries, or how much money he spends, he just can’t settle down. In the last decade he’s had a string of briefly euphoric yet ultimately poisonous relationships. It doesn’t matter how exciting the relationships are in the beginning. After a while little things just start to grate on Chelsea: the training sessions, the man-management or HOW MANY TIMES HAVE I TOLD YOU, THE 2 UNLIMITED CDS SHOULD BE FILED UNDER ‘T’, NOT BEFORE ‘A’. Now, it seems, his tumultuous fling with Antonio Conte is coming towards the end.
How the flip has it come to this? It’s barely five months since Chelsea completed a monstrously impressive title win yet they are in a familiar mess, with stories being leaked to the press about the usual. It would be wrong to accuse modern footballers of stabbing managers in the back; they have somebody else to do that for them.
Jose Mourinho is the only manager of the Abramovich era to last more than two seasons, and it’s hard to see Conte changing that. He might not even last 18 months. There are reasons for their relatively poor start – injuries, failure to sign Tom, Dick and Harry, no midweek breaks like last year – but they are only three points worse off than at the same stage last season. That isn’t, or at least shouldn’t be, a sackable offence. It’s starting to look like there is an institutional addiction to novelty at Chelsea.
Today they host fourth-placed Watford, who have had a tremendous start under the impressive Marco Silva. Like Chelsea, they have been desperately seeking stability. Unlike Chelsea, they may have found it.
Kick off is at 12.30pm.
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