It is hard to imagine former boss Jose Mourinho ever calling Chelsea underdogs, but that is how successor Guus Hiddink has described them before their Champions League last-16 second-leg clash against Paris Saint-Germain today.
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PSG, who won the first leg of the last-16 tie 2-1 in Paris, reached the last eight for the fourth successive season 4-2 on aggregate after having the upper hand for most of a compelling match.
Chelsea hit back with a superbly-constructed equaliser when Diego Costa checked past Thiago Silva to fire wide of Kevin Trapp after 27 minutes, but the hosts lost their cutting edge when Costa went off injured and Ibrahimovic turned in Di Maria’s cross from close range after 67 minutes. They have achieved exactly that feat before, when lifting the European Cup for the only time in their history, despite finishing outside the Premier League’s top four, in 2012.
The Spain global hasn’t had the best of seasons going by his usual standards and he has scored just one goal in the Champions League in two seasons with Chelsea. They started with the photoshopped movie posters that saw their players as various heroes into famous Hollywood flicks and have now taken it one step further by trolling Blues’ striker Diego Costa.
The Swedish striker is now 34 years old, and seemingly in the final months of his spell with PSG, so this could be potentially his final UEFA Champions League game.
Costa’s 11th goal in 15 games breathed new life into a Chelsea side which had until that point looked unlikely to find a way past the PSG defense. He had two or three actions that looked like Hazard.
“We had in the first half also some efforts but we were not cool enough around the box”.
Guus Hiddink has yet to taste defeat in the league during his 12 games in charge, with his only defeat coming away to PSG in the first leg.
Manager Laurent Blanc will probably have to replace key midfielder Marco Verratti with Argentinian playmaker Javier Pastore as Verratti has a recurring groin problem.
Chelsea finished the half the stronger though.
Tottenham Hotspur starlet Nathan Oduwa has saluted the football played by Paris Saint-Germain in their Champions League victory over Chelsea this evening.
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It began with some nice link-up play between Willian and Pedro, who stole ball from Thiago Motta, and ended with some Costa magic.
