Cardiff vs Chelsea: The Little Horse Gets Over the Final Hurdle

Torres + Schürrle counting Salah's offtarget shots

With the little horse completely out of the title race on the final day of the season, discussion in the build-up focused on how many of the players who limped to a 0-0 against Norwich (NORWICH FFS) may have played their last game at Stamford Bridge. Thankfully, the World Cup may reduce the number of tedious rumours that will surround half the team until pens are put to paper.

With the back five arguably creating the majority of highlights this season, Mourinho opted for a complete rejigging … just because he can. Which gave Ashley Cole one more opportunity to remind Mourinho that he’s good enough to attend Christmas parties — wherever they are being held. It also gave the travelling support one more chance to try and reduce him to tears letting him know they want him to stay.

Fernando Torres got the nod ahead of Demba Ba and Samuel 'only scores at Stamford Bridge’ Eto’o. Torres, of course, promptly rewarded Mourinho with that vote of confidence by getting tangled up in some balloons in the opening minutes and then having his brilliant shot denied by Steven Caulker. Only then did the Cardiff grounds crew decide that they needed to dispose of the balloons before the game continued.

With that miss and a sound shout for an early penalty, it surprised no one who’s followed Chelsea this season that not only would Cardiff go and score first, but the man to do it would be Craig Bellamy. In fact, he’s put enough goals past Chelsea to almost see a bid for him over the summer to replace outgoing striker and neutrals favourite Demba Ba.

We want you to stay, we want you to stay!

Mohamed Salah was told to return to Chelsea this summer ready to be a footballer. And he certainly wasn’t prepared to do it even a minute sooner. Sure he ran about a bit and peppered the home support with his errant shots more. All in all, he troubled no one but the ball boys having to retrieve all those ridiculous efforts. While Salah was doing what he could to look busy with the boss watching, Juan Mata was off scoring his 6th goal since heading up North. 

André Schürrle came on looking intent on not getting sent to Vitesse next season and was a little more productive with his direct runs. Although he attempted one third of the shots that Salah did - he managed to get twice as many on target. And all under a half hour on the pitch. German efficiency kicking in ahead of the World Cup.

Despite his earlier tussles with the troublesome balloons, Fernando Torres saved Chelsea from ending on a bit of a dour note with his match winning goal! In spite of it being another important goal, the Diego Costa fan club seemed genuinely gutted that Torres’  hard work paid off today. Thankfully they were hiding behind their laptop screens so that Torres and co. got the exceptional support that they deserved.

It wasn’t a classic end of season performance and left Mourinho out of the top 2 for the first time in his career, but at least the season ended with a win. Chelsea were just short a couple of goals from Lisbon and without that unfortunate trip to Villa Park could have seen them adding to their trophy cabinet again this season. With all said and done, it’s not too bad for a little horse with ‘no strikers’. 

jb x