A cracker till the end

On Monday Frank Lampard’s goal from the penalty spot was not just a goal for Chelsea but a goal for Arsenal and Manchester City as well.  Chelsea’s two to one victory over Manchester United has breathed some life back into this Premier League title race.  And while Chelsea may not have a shot at the title, at least we can try to drag ourselves into third place. 

The game itself was a cracker.  Both teams went at it from the get-go.  I regret not being able to watch the first half because of class but I ran all the way back to my dorm once it was done, and what did I find?  Chelsea down a goal to nil.   I nearly cried then and there.  But I stuck it out and was well rewarded with one of the best games I have seen in a long time.  Both teams pushed relentlessly, for United Rooney and Nani were a dangerous combination that looked threatening in front of goal and came rather close on a number of occasions.  In fact Chelsea’s latest acquisition David Luiz spent half the game stand so close to Rooney you couldn’t be sure whether he was marking him or simply had a weird fetish.  And Chelsea’s attack was a bit more varied, we saw a lot of action of both sides of the wings as well as some nice penetrating pushes down the middle.  And this clearly helped as in the 54^th minute Luiz decided to take a break from guarding Rooney and successfully took a crack at goal.  And everyone in the world who was not a Manchester United fan started jumping for joy. 

The game continued in much the same way after the goal, the only real incident of note was when David Luiz gave Rooney a nice knock form behind, which should have been his second yellow of the night, but for some reason the ref went on with the game without so much as batting his eyebrow.  This caused quite a stir amongst United fans and their manager Sir Alex Fergusen and gave the rest of the world something to laugh about. 

In and around the 70^th minute Chelsea made a rather crucial substitution, Malouda out – Zhiakov in.  And after bringing some much needed energy to the left wing, the young Russian was also nice enough to get us a penalty.  Yay!  Again the was the usual screaming and shouting about the legitimacy of the decision and considering the ref’s track record for the game, they had every right.  And even I, a die hard Chelsea fan think that it was not a penalty; but I’ll take it.  Boy oh boy will I take it.  And take it magnificently Lampard did. 

Of course that did not mean United were down and out,  they haven’t wont he title half a million times for nothing.  They fought back like a wounded tiger.  Fierce and deadly.  Each attack seemed like it would bring an equalizer for the league leaders.  But Chelsea held out with the use of some hilarious time wasting tactics even as the game went into “Fergie” time.  Like I said, we may not win the race, but burn me if we don’t try.