Match Report: Wigan 0-2 Chelsea

A SOLID start to the Season

Chelsea got their Premier League campaign off to a perfect start, with a 2-0 away win over Wigan Athletic.

Roberto Di Matteo fielded a strong starting XI that included new signing Eden Hazard, while Ryan Bertrand was given a start in the midfield after Ramires was ruled out. Hazard was deployed on right flank with our new boy Oscar was on the bench.

It didn't take Chelsea's new signing Eden Hazard much time to show his quality. Barely 2 minutes into the game, he turned and slipped past his marker and set Ivanovic free on the right-hand side. Ivanovic duly drilled it home, giving Chelsea a 1-0 lead.

Eden Hazard particularly was looking dangerous and it was only a matter of time before he was involved again. Playing on the right wing, he dribbled past one defender before another defender brought him down inside the box. The ref pointed to the spot. Penalty! Frank Lampard stepped up to take it and easily converted.It was 2-0 to Chelsea as Hazard had made an instant impact. Frank Lampard has now taken 40 penalties for Chelsea FC in the Premier League, scoring 37 of them.

Jokes: Eden Hazard shuts up trollers and haters ;)

The Wigan defenders had no reply to Hazard's pace, and resorted to fouling him instead. Gary Caldwell was eventually cautioned by ref Mike Jones.

With a 2 goal lead now established, Chelsea began to sit deep and patiently search for the third goal. This meant that Wigan had plenty of possession, but could actually do very little with it. Former Blue Franco Di Santo had a chance to score, but his header went well wide. Moses also managed to test Cech with a powerful shot from the wing, but Cech got hands it.

Di Santo had another chance to score, but Cech managed to save and Luiz eventually cleared the danger. Wigan did have a free-kick right before half-time, but Shaun Maloney's free-kick was hit straight at Cech wihich was considered nothing more than catching practice for Cech.

Wigan had most of the possession in the beginning of the 2nd half, but they failed to make any use of it. Di Santo once again failed to convert a chance after Alcaraz had delivered a perfect cross into the box.

Chelsea really didn't create many chances but the most notable ones were Cole's miss-timed half volley and a Torres toe-poke that was cleared off the line.

In the 63rd minute, Oscar was brought on, replacing Eden Hazard. Oscar was deployed in a much centeral role and looked pretty comfortable knocking the ball around. Wigan also brought on their new signing Kone who made very little or no impact to the game in the later stages. Oscar almost scored his debut goal, flashing a shot just wide of the post after being put through by a Fernando Torres flick.

Unlucky Fernando: His attempt was cleared off the line

Fernando Torres also had his attempt cleared off the line. The shot wasn't that convincing but still was a good effort by Torres. This was pretty unlucky for him as he surely would have loved to opened his account in the Premier League.

A few minutes later, Jordi Gomez had the best chance of the game for Wigan when a pass from Figueroa found him unmarked inside the Chelsea box but he sent the header high & wide. Wigan created a few more chances through Gomez and Kone, who were actually linking up well but failed to make anything out of those chances. Chelsea were pretty comfortably siting on the ball passing around waiting for the perfect opening. Chelsea had 52% of the possession, 7 corners, 14 goal attempts and 4 on target. The game eventually ended giving Chelsea a solid and comfortable start to the season.

Well I was pretty convinced with the performance. Chelsea played together as a team and for me they clicked really well. It shows that all our new boys are starting to find their feet and combinations with the other lads. A clean sheet for me was probably one of the most important things. Chelsea looked really organized, strong and compact at the back and had very less problems.

All smiles: Man of the match

Eden Hazard was awarded the Man of the Match in his first ever Premier League match. Goal.com also rated him with 4 stars and this was what they had to say about him,

"The Belgian settled into life in the Premier League very easily with an excellent performance that caused the Wigan defence all kinds of problems. His close control, pace and skill enabled him to find and create space whilst his passing was always accurate and showed the vision that he has. He swivelled away from Ramis beautifully in the second minute and played a perfect pass into Ivanovic who opened the scoring. Four minutes later he caused more trouble down the right hand side, nipping past Figueroa inside the penalty area before being brought down by Ramis to earn his side a penalty. He was replaced by Oscar in the 64th minute."

All these signs are pretty positive and it all suggests that there is only better and better to come from Chelsea. We now play newly promoted Reading on Wednesday night and Di Matteo would hope for another strong performance from the boys.

Our Video Report would also be out pretty soon so don't forget to watch that right here. Do let us know what you think about the match. Were you happy? What more do you expect?

KTBFFH!

TweetFollow @CFC360Official