The first half’s dominance was highlighted by Eden Hazard playing as the attacking midfielder behind Diego Costa.
Advertisement
“You are fluent in your decisions, you choose well your movements, you choose well the number of touches you give to the ball, when to hold, when to keep possession, when to touch, first touch”.
“Fundamentally I am happy for the players because they are working well”. I tried to find out but sometimes you don’t know.
Hazard agrees: “It’s my fourth season now”. This win has lifted the defending champions only one place, but the performance will given Jose Mourinho’s men a lot of confidence going forward. In the first half as he skipped away from a cluster of Norwich players there was a gasp, not so much of pleasure as relief, recognition, curdled hope. “If you ask me about winning the the title, I would say impossible mission”. “I just want to play”. If they played with five at the back I would have played with three at the back and used Kenedy as a left winger.
He has discussed it with his manager.
It ended Costa’s six-game scoring drought in all competitions and allowed Mourinho – back in the dugout after a stadium ban – some breathing space after Chelsea’s consecutive losses to West Ham, Liverpool and Stoke.
But one person who is not very excited about the win is Chelsea Manager Jose Mourinho who has said that he was not impressed by the way his team played, despite “escaping” with three points. “Maybe I have to play a No. 10 because we have to try”, Hazard explained. I don’t know if I have to play every game there. And then because the situation is fragile, where we think everything goes against us and we are never lucky, we put ourselves in a position in the last four minutes where they had a throw-in, a corner, a rebound and you can lose two points.
‘He’s the best manager. ‘I don’t have a problem with him, ‘ he said.
“I heard a lot of things about this, but no, everything is good with him”, Hazard said on Sunday. “Now it is Maccabi (Tel Aviv in the Champions League) and we hope we can win and maybe the Porto versus Dynamo Kiev result allows us to qualify before the last match”. “Maybe not this season, because it will be hard, but next season and onwards”.
Costa scored his fourth goal of the season after Cesc Fabregas’ quick free-kick, but should have had two more and Mourinho felt his side should have won more comfortably.
Norwich boss Alex Neil pondered what might have been, too, after feeling aggrieved not to be awarded a penalty when Willian clumsily challenged Robbie Brady.
Advertisement
He was replaced by Cameron Jerome.
