Chelsea held off a battling Norwich City at Carrow Road on Tuesday to seal a 2-1 win and stretch their unbeaten run to 12 games.
The Blues went ahead through Kenedy as the Brazilian score the fastest goal of the PL inside the first 39 seconds, and Diego Costa doubled their lead right on half time in controversial fashion as he appeared to be offside.
Norwich improved in the second half as Cameron Jerome went close on several occasions butNathan Redmond’s strike proved to be nothing more than a consolation as Chelsea held on for the win.
With yet another three points Guus Hiddink’s side are now in eight place on 39 points and haven’t loss since Jose Mourinho was fired in December. Norwich slip into the drop zone on goal difference as Alex Neil‘s men but in a valiant display but lost for the seventh time in their last eight outings.
After just 39 seconds Chelsea took the lead with Eden Hazard running at the heart of Norwich’s defense and then feeding the ball to Kenedy who slammed into the bottom corner to score his first PL goal for the club. 1-0, and the Blues had scored the fastest goal in the PL so far this season.
Norwich did have a decent spell of possession for a while in the first half but failed to create any clear cut chances and Chelsea killed them off in first half stoppage time.
Costa — who was clearly offside when Bertrand Traore played him the ball — raced clear and made it 2-0 as he delicately dinked home over the onrushing Declan Rudd. The cruise control button was ready to be hit.
Norwich made a go of it in the second half, though. Jerome stretched out at the back post but sent his effort just wide as Norwich looked for a way back into the game and moments later Russell Martin‘s header across goal found Jerome but he somehow hit the crossbar with the goal gaping.
The Canaries did make it interesting as they pulled a goal back with 20 minutes to go. Wes Hoolahan found Redmond in the box and drilled home past Thibaut Courtois – 2-1, game on.
Late on Jerome kept plugging away but Courtois saved his redirected effort and then Norwich suffered from a nasty collision between two of their own players. Gary O’Neill and Robbie Bradycollided and the latter sent his teeth into O’Neill’s forehead. Ouch.
Redmond struck a shot into the side-netting late on as Chelsea dropped deep and invited pressure, but the Blues held on to continue their charge up the table.
Source: yahoo
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