Chelsea vs Fulham: John Obi Mikel - Goal Machine

185 Games in the Making

It doesn’t get much more exciting than derby day does it? Well, unless of course your derby is with Putney based upstarts – Fulham. With their performances such as they are, and their massive support making it the whole 2 miles up the road, it wasn’t going to really be classic derby atmosphere.  But this match took it to a new level without even a card being issued over the course of 90 minutes.

If ever there were 45 minutes of football where two clubs did what they could to not score, let alone a shot – the first half of Chelsea vs Fulham was it.  Which was why it was all the more shocking that there was a spattering of boos at the first half whistle. Was it annoyance that they wanted those 45 minutes back? Performances weren’t poor enough to warrant that sort of reaction from the dozen or so that didn’t nip out to beat the queue for lager.

Without the promise of a creative, bearded little wonder to come on, it was really anyone’s guess if the second half would see an improvement.  Mourinho saw sense to remove “32 year old” striker Eto’o When the entire ground starts calling for Torres – you know he’s not put in a great performance. And although Torres did give Fulham’s defenders something to do for the first time on Saturday, he failed to find the back of the net. But two people did …

Oscar, helped to some degree by some questionable keeping from Stockdale, opened the scoring and reminded 40,000 people that they were meant to be at a football match. The atmosphere progressively swelled as the match started to take some shape.

But Oscar’s man of the match performance was the ugly step-sister to the second goal of the match – from none other than John Obi Mikel. This space had really been reserved to lament the missing Juan Mata. But after 185 Premier League appearances before his first goal – it’s all about Mikel. Season after season his shots have been getting more in the vicinity of goal with the occasional one straying on target. But Saturday’s goal and subsequent goal were far from fluke. It also means the defensive midfielder has more goals in the league than all of Chelsea’s strikers combined. A record he’s sure to hold for some time as long as Eto’o and Demba Ba are first choice.

In fact, this goal was so disruptive to the space-time continuum of football, that Mario Balotelli went and missed a penalty just 24 hours later. The first ever penalty miss of his footballing career. Prepare yourselves for the footballing week ahead.

The match wasn’t what one hopes for and expects form a proper derby. It's not one that anyone will remember, but it’s the points and not performance that win the league. For a club in crisis, to be level on points with Manchester City and only 2 points from top, it’s more akin to a minor inconvenience.

And for anyone who needs a reminder: ‘Chelsea manager is Jose Mourinho, not  Jamie Redknapp.’  

Expect some wholesale changes to the lineup that faces Swindon on Tuesday – it could even mean a start for Juan Mata.

jb x