Chelsea suffered but won by ten thanks to Sterling’s brace

Chelsea achieved a long-suffering victory over Leicester after being outnumbered (2-1) and recovered from the blow suffered the previous day in the Premier against Leeds (3-0).

Without Thomas Tuchel on the bench as he was suspended for his scuffle with Antonio Conte in the derby against Tottenham, the ‘blues’ suffered the dismissal of Connor Gallagher in the first half, but after the break Raheem Sterling scored his first two goals since he arrived this summer from Manchester City.

Harvey Barnes closed the gap and Chelsea survived a late Leicester siege thanks to the interventions of their goalkeeper Édouard Mendy and also the crossbar, which deflected a shot from Tenerife’s Ayoze Pérez.

Red to Gallagher

The first half ended goalless despite being entertaining for the crowd and both teams having chances. Just before half time Connor Gallagher saw a second yellow card for cutting into a dangerous counter with a foul on Barnes.

Even though they were down, Chelsea managed to go into the break with an advantage thanks to a break from Reece James who returned the post (43′).

Sterling, two goals and a post

The second half was amazing. Once play resumed, Sterling opened the scoring with a bit of luck when his shot from the edge of the box went wide after catching the boot of Daniel Amartey and the ball went past Danny Ward (47′).

Sterling scored again moments later against Marc Cucurella, only to receive after the rebound but his low shot hit the post (50′).

After an hour of play, James shot past Kai Havertz from the right, whose perfect cross only had to be pushed into the net by Sterling (62′).

Leicester make Chelsea suffer

Leicester’s reaction was immediate and Barnes, their most dangerous player, beat Mendy at the short post behind a wall with Jamie Vardy on the left of the attack (66′).

From there until the end it was a monologue of the ‘foxes’. Newcomer Kelchi Iheanacho had the first chance to equalize with a shot that narrowly missed (70′). Mendy made it big by stopping Barnes’ low shot (73′) and coming out of his goal to cover Vardy’s shot (79′). At the end, the crossbar deflected Ayoze Pérez’s whiplash (87′).

Chelsea ended up calling for time but ended up reigning in character and moved up to sixth place. Leicester deservedly drew but remain penultimate with just one point from four games.