Tag: Ben Chilwell

Chelsea might just be turning the corner, win third game in seven days

Chelsea’s 3-1 win over Leicester completed a much-needed good week for the Blues

Graham Potter’s start at Chelsea has been something of a struggle, but this week things might have started to change for the better.

Chelsea’s confident 3-1 win at Leicester City — their first victory away from Stamford Bridge since October 16 — made it a perfect seven days for Potter’s side.

Last Saturday’s narrow 1-0 win over Leeds bought some time for the club, and a crucial (and largely deserved) 2-0 win over Dortmund sent Chelsea through to the Champions League quarterfinals mid-week.

Just under two weeks ago, things were so much different. Potter was telling reporters that he hadn’t earned much good faith from the club amid questions over whether he would be sacked after less than five months on the job.

Winning last Saturday and then again on Tuesday was helpful, but only brought so much in terms of stability. A bad result against relegation-threatened Leicester would have brought all the doubts back to the fore, as Chelsea could have still been in the bottom half of the table if Aston Villa were to win on Sunday.

Instead, the Blues looked confident from the start, and got their reward as Ben Chilwell’s angled volley found a way through traffic for an 11th minute opener.

Still, Chelsea has struggled to turn positive spells into wins, and Patson Daka’s splendid 39th minute equalizer felt like the kind of blow a team in such a fragile place might not respond well to. Between Ricardo Pereira’s spinning backheel and Daka’s beautifully-placed shot from distance, the crowd at King Power Stadium roared back to life.

However, Kai Havertz — who scored the Blues’ Champions League winner from the spot mid-week — popped up with another goal in a crucial moment. In the sixth minute of first-half stoppage time, and facing a wall of eight Leicester players behind the ball, Enzo Fernández surveyed his options and made eye contact with Havertz.

Leicester may have suspected a through ball was coming, but Fernández and Havertz had something different in mind: a lob, paired with a perfectly-timed run between the center backs, allowed an onside Havertz to cruelly guide the ball over Danny Ward, giving Chelsea their lead back at the perfect time.

Leicester made an effort to come back, but ultimately Chelsea did what a big club is supposed to do: manage the game with confidence, and then finish it off with an additional goal.

Havertz was involved again, getting in behind to float a cross to Mykhailo Mudryk. The Ukrainian didn’t have an option to turn the delivery into a shot, so he did the next best thing, cushioning a header to Mateo Kovačić for an improvised finish.

“It’s been a really positive week for us,” Potter told Sky Sports after the match. “Three wins against Leeds, Dortmund and today says a lot about the development of the team. It’s a hard fought game, as they always are, but in the end I thought we deserved to win.”

“Three wins in the week at this level is very pleasing,” added Potter before underlining the fact that there’s still a long road ahead. “We have to follow that up with a win next weekend and then into the international break. We will try to get three points against Everton.”

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Ben Chilwell has no idea who Landon Donovan or Clint Dempsey is

Christian Pulisic was in disbelief hearing his teammate’s lack of American soccer knowledge

This one may be tough for American soccer fans to swallow.

Chelsea left back Ben Chilwell has said he is unfamiliar with not one, but both of the men widely considered the two greatest U.S. men’s players of all time.

In a segment for Complex alongside USMNT star and Chelsea teammate Christian Pulisic, Chilwell revealed he does not know who either Landon Donovan or Clint Dempsey is.

The nerve!

In the segment called “GOAT Talk” Pulisic was asked what his favorite World Cup moment of all time was and answered, as many USMNT fans do, that it was Landon Donovan’s dramatic late winner against Algeria in the 2010 World Cup.

“I don’t know who Landon Donovan is,” Chilwell said.

“You don’t know who Landon Donovan is?” Pulisic replied in disbelief.

“Is that bad? Is he like a big player” Chilwell asked.

“He’s probably the best ever American!” Pulisic said.

It would get worse though! Pulisic was asked his opinion on the greatest American player ever, and after explaining that there was a debate among fans between Donovan and Dempsey, he answered that he would pick Dempsey due to his history playing alongside the ex-Fulham and Tottenham forward with the USMNT.

“I couldn’t tell you who that is,” Chilwell said of a player who spent seven seasons in the Premier League.

Thankfully, Chilwell is able to name at least one American player.

Asked who his American GOAT was, Chilwell had an easy answer.

“I don’t know a lot of American footballers,” Chilwell said, stating the obvious, “but I know one who plays for Chelsea. His name’s Christian. He’s a pretty good footballer.”

Watch Chilwell and Pulisic’s segment on Complex

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Leicester – Watford was a snoozer for 89 minutes, then got absolutely bananas

Ben Chilwell and Craig Dawson turned a boring game into an instant classic with two goals in the dying minutes of the match.

Leicester City took on Watford in the early Premier League match on Saturday, and for much of the game, the two looked like sides that hadn’t played professional soccer in a while. Players looked a touch slow. The passes weren’t connecting right.

For a league that’s been shut down for a while for the coronavirus pandemic, it’s expected that you’re not going to get beautiful soccer for a little while.

But then, late in the match, we got absolutely beautiful, mad, wild soccer.

The madness started in the 90th minute. Ben Chilwell, the highly rated left back who’s been linked with a mega move to Chelsea, hadn’t done much of anything for the entire game.

Then he went and did this:

It’s the type of goal you dream about, an absolutely purely hit left-footed bomb off the post. That sound in the empty stadium, too. [Chef’s kiss.]

For fans who were watching the game and slogged through 89 minutes of bleh, it was a beautiful relief.

Then a few minutes later, in stoppage time, Watford scored an overhead kick equalizer from Craig Dawson of all people.

It happened! Both those things happened!

The match ended 1-1. I need a cigarette.

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