A Confident Win for Chelsea!

Well, my prediction was a bit off. While the score-line suggests that it was a close game, in reality Chelsea cruised to a comfortable 2-1 win over Sunderland this morning, with goals coming from John Terry and Daniel Sturridge. A Sunderland goal in the 90th minute by Ji Dong-Won robbed me of getting a correct prediction of 2-0, and robbed Chelsea of upping their goal difference by 2.

Lampard (8), the heavily-tattooed Meireles (16), Terry (26), Sturridge (23), and Ramires (7) celebrate Terry's goal in the 18th minute.

Chelsea played quite a different starting 11 than I expected, starting Sturridge and Meireles, and benching Fernando Torres and David Luiz. It was only a couple days ago that André Villas-Boas gave a speech saying that nobody's place in the starting 11 is safe, including Terry (the captain), Lampard (a loyal Chelsea midfielder) and Torres (the $80 million striker), if their performances negatively impact the team. However, I don't think anybody was expecting him to make the decision to bench Torres today. However, it seems to have yielded good results in today's match.
Here was the Chelsea lineup for this morning's match:

        Mata (Torres) ----------------- Anelka (Romeu) ----------------- Sturridge (Malouda)

                  Lampard ----------------- Meireles ----------------- Ramires

           Cole ----------------- Terry ----------------- Ivanovic ----------------- Bosingwa

                                                    Cech

Bench: Hilário, McEachran, Kalou, David Luiz, Torres, Romeu, Malouda

PLAYER OVERVIEW:
I'm assuming here that David Luiz was not quite fit enough to play today, just coming off an injury, but he will most likely play in next week's match against Manchester United. Petr Cech, in his first game off a knee injury, played very well today, making a few nice saves; however, he was not really tested very much during the game, with Sunderland only getting off 4 shots on target. Mata (as usual) played a brilliant game, giving Ashley Cole a beautiful through-ball early in the match (although unfortunately no goal came of it), and made an excellent run that almost became a goal. His free kick was very well-taken, hitting the right post from a few yards out of the box. The free kick ultimately led to a brilliant left-footed finish by John Terry. Anelka, replacing Fernando Torres in the centre of the attacking line, played well and came very close to scoring. New boy Raul Meireles played well, effectively slotting into a deep midfield role and assisting the goal by Sturridge. Daniel Sturridge, coming off a 3-game suspension, worked hard in a forward role and scored a brilliant back-heeled goal. He also helped assist the goal by Terry. Now that André Villas-Boas has seen what his new players can do, it should be very interesting to see the starting 11 that he'll play against Manchester United next week.

GAME OVERVIEW:
In the first five minutes of the match, Chelsea takes almost complete control of possession, although neither team is able to create any real opportunities. However, in the 10th minute, Juan Mata sends a beautiful through-ball to Ashley Cole, who gets a shot off on target, but it's deflected out for a corner. Frank Lampard takes the corner, but it comes to naught. In the 12th minute, Sunderland gets their first real opportunity of the game, with the 6'5" Nicklas Bendtner heading a ball away from the net after a Sunderland free kick. While everybody is wondering how Sunderland aren't winning 1-0, Mata gets a free kick and hits the post with a beautiful shot. The rebound bounces around the box until it lands at the feet of Daniel Sturridge, who spies John Terry making a run on the left side. Sturridge lifts a beautiful ball to Terry, who shoots and and gets his shot cleared off the line and right back at him. He shoots again, this time making no mistake as he left-foots it through space in the defense to make the score-line 1-0. In the 23rd minute, Jack Colback (Sunderland) gets booked for a very reckless challenge that was never going to touch the ball, and only served to injure Ramires slightly. He plays on however, and until half-time Chelsea take quite a few shots, all of which are blocked by defenders, mainly Wes Brown, the former Manchester United player. At one point near half-time, Juan Mata is tackled cleanly by Bardsley of Sunderland, but while stepping over the Chelsea player, it seems that Bardsley stamps on Mata's back. While he receives no card, it is clear that Mata is hurt, although he keeps playing. The commentators then remarked that on Monday, the photos of the stamp will be shown to the FA, and they might hand Bardsley a suspension. Whether it was deliberate or not, nobody knows. In the 51st minute, Raul Meireles sends a beautiful lifted through-ball to Daniel Sturridge, who times his run perfectly and receives it well. He's on a collision course with Wes Brown and goalkeeper Simon Mignolet, so he pulls a neat back heel that travels the width of the box and goal into the net. 2-0 Chelsea. In the 62nd minute, Malouda comes on for Sturridge; in the 74th minute, Torres replaces Mata; and in the 79th, Oriol Romeu makes his debut by taking off Anelka. All three substitutes fail to make much of an impact in the game, and Chelsea cruise comfortably until Nicklas Bendtner assists a goal by Ji Dong-Won to make the score-line 2-1 in the 90th minute, and Bosingwa is booked.
FINAL SCORE: Sunderland 1-2 Chelsea

Match Highlights (sorry about the non-English commentary - it was the only highlight reel on Youtube)

MATCH STATISTICS:

                                           Sunderland                   Chelsea

Ball Possession (%)                   40                               60

Shots (on target)                      11(4)                          16(5)

Corners                                      4                                 7

Crosses                                     17                                7

Fouls Committed                       7                                 3

Yellow Cards                             1                                 1

Red Cards                                  0                                 0

Offsides                                     2                                 3

OTHER FIXTURES:

Bolton 0-5 Manchester United

Manchester City 3-0 Wigan Athletic

Stoke City 1-0 Liverpool

Wolverhampton 0-2 Tottenham

Everton 2-2 Aston Villa

Arsenal 1-0 Swansea City

Manchester United stays top of the table with 12 points and a goal difference of +15, with Manchester City very close behind with an equal number of points and a +12 goal difference. Chelsea are third with 10 points and a goal difference of +4. Stoke City's 1-0 win over Liverpool leave them in fourth, with 8 points and a +2 goal difference, and Liverpool sit in fifth spot with 7 points and a +3 goal difference. On Sunday, September 18, we're all in for a few excellent games, with Chelsea playing Manchester United at Old Trafford, Tottenham and Liverpool facing off, and Manchester City taking on Fulham. After next weekend, the premier league table could look completely different. 

Have a great week!

P.S. Look! I added a Premier League Table to the right of the page! Pretty cool, eh?