Key events
Here the xG, if you’re into that sort of thing.
Chelsea: 2.91, despite having just 35% possession.
Liverpool: 1.17.
That seems to fit the scoreline.
Chelsea’s Cole Palmer speaks to the cameras:
Liverpool are champions for a reason but I think we had desire and good fight and we edged them. Shit happens, obviously I went three months without scoring, but it just gave me more motivation to keep working. Social media is just full of idiots but I just want to help my team.
You feel like you’re letting your team down when you miss chances. I’ve had doubters all my life, it doesn’t bother me. I was trying things today, first-time passes. I felt normal today.
In other news, London City Lionesses have been promoted to the Women’s Super League after a dramatic final day in the Women’s Championship.
A reminder of today’s other Premier League results. Only Newcastle’s draw at Brighton has any implications for Champions League qualification.
An update from Germany: Bayer Leverkusen could only draw at Freiburg, so Bayern Munich have been crowned champions of the Bundesliga! That is Harry Kane’s first ever major trophy.
Chelsea were excellent today. To score after just three minutes, with such a beautiful goal, gave them a huge base to build from. Palmer, Lavia, Cucurella and Madueke were the standout players.
Not sure how deeply we need to look into that Liverpool defeat. Their mentality was poor today, but that is not unexpected after the highs of last week. Slot rung the changes, and just as he did against Plymouth in the FA Cup in February, Liverpool did not gel.
This is what that result does to the league table. Chelsea are now three points clear of Forest and Villa and will watch on with interest as Forest take on Palace on Monday night.
Full-time: Chelsea 3-1 Liverpool
The champions are beaten!
GOAL! Chelsea 3-1 Liverpool (Palmer pen 90+7)
Palmer caps a wonderful display by passing the ball to Alisson’s right. Liverpool’s goalkeeper guesses right but can’t reach the penalty, right in the side netting. That’s the game! Maresca roars in delight on the sideline. A huge three points for Chelsea.
Penalty to Chelsea!
90+5 min: Sancho runs towards the corner flag to try to run the clock down. Szoboszlai wins the ball back but a sloppy pass allows Caicedo to nip in ahead of Quansah, and the Liverpool defender trips the Ecuadorian in the box. Penalty!
90+4 min: Salah is so far short of his normal exceptional standards today. The man can’t trap a beanbag today.
90+2 min: Chelsea are doing a decent job of running down the clock. Mac Allister careers into Gusto in frustration as Liverpool desperately try to get the ball back. A Chelsea free-kick will waste a few more seconds.
90 min: Corner to Chelsea, they take their time, then take it short and immediately lose possession of the ball.
Five minutes added on for Liverpool to get an equaliser.
89 min: Chelsea make another change: goalscorer Fernandez off for Reece James.
87 min: Chelsea so easily could be 3-0 up but now they face an anxious last few minutes to secure the three points, which are so precious in the race for Champions League qualification.
GOAL! Chelsea 2-1 Liverpool (Van Dijk 85)
How bizarre! Chelsea fail to mark Van Dijk from a corner, and the Dutchman has a completely free run to meet the cross, heading powerfully past Sanchez. Game on? Game on!
83 min: Federico Chiesa comes on for his fifth appearance of the season, which means that he now qualifies for a Premier League medal. The Italian replaces Tsimikas. Liverpool are going for it.
Chelsea also made a change: Lavia off, Gusto on. Caicedo will go into midfield, Gusto to right back.
81 min: Palmer hits the post! The England midfielder ghosts past Bradley to the byline. Everything, including Palmer’s eyes, indicate he is going to pull the ball back to a teammate but Palmer instead shoots from the tightest of angles. Alisson is completely out of position but the ball rebounds out off the far post and to safety.
79 min: After 15 minutes defending their own box, Chelsea spring forward and so nearly make it 3-0. Madueke has a shot blocked but Fernandez collects the loose ball, feeds Sancho on the left and the Chelsea substitute has a free shot at goal, albeit from an acute angle, saved by Alisson!
Jonathan Liew
78 min: John Kerry is here. He’s sitting just behind the Chelsea dugout in the posh seats. The former US presidential candidate and secretary of state, not the former England captain, although it’s just about possible he’s here as the result of some comic mixup. I don’t know what to do with this information. I don’t know what you’re supposed to do with this information. But there it is.
77 min: It’s just not happening for Liverpool. Nunez has been sloppy since coming on and now Salah misses what he would consider to be an easy header! Tsimikas crossed from the left and Salah met it at the far post, but could only guide his effort wide.
73 min: Chelsea have fallen into a mid/low block, and Liverpool are enjoying plenty of possession, and now have Szoboszlai and Mac Allister on the ball.
I should say that there were some other chants from Chelsea fans: ‘always the victim’. Grim.
71 min: Chelsea respond with a change of their own: Jadon Sancho replaces Nicolas Jackson. That means Madueke will go to the right and Neto will play as a central striker.
69 min: Some substitutions to tell you about: Liverpool take Elliott and Endo off for Mac Allister and Szoboszlai.
67 min: Liverpool lurch forward again. The visitors have found some momentum in the last five minutes, and Salah shows his first real moment of quality, clipping a deep cross to the back post. Nunez climbs unopposed, it is a free header, but the Uruguayan nods his header well wide. Replays show the Liverpool striker was offside but that was an awful effort regardless.
65 min: Which is taken by Elliott and blasted straight into the Chelsea wall.
64 min: Bradley goes through the gears to burst beyond Cururella, showing the energy that Alexander-Arnold failed to show in his 58 minutes on the pitch, before passing nicely inside. Chalobah rugby tackles Salah on the edge of Chelsea’s box and Liverpool have a dangerous free-kick.
63 min: Chelsea supporters have started singing about Steve Gerrard and Demba Ba, I am obliged to report.
61 min: Liverpool finally find some composure on the ball. Bradley makes a clever run down the right, but Chalobah reads the cross and makes a vital interception behind. From the resulting corner, Van Dijk has a free header (!) but the Dutchman can only nod it over the bar. It was a fair way out, in fairness, around the penalty spot.
59 min: Slot makes a double change, maybe 14 minutes too late. Nunez on for Jota, Bradley on for Alexander-Arnold.
58 min: Liverpool look completely at sea. Jones hasn’t had a kick in midfield, Salah anonymous on the right wing. Quansah, probably frustrated from the own goal, flies into a tackle with Fernandez, and is booked. He won the ball, in fairness, but it was a wild challenge.
GOAL! Chelsea 2-0 Liverpool (Quansah og, 56)
Chelsea double their lead with a wonderfully ugly goal! Palmer coasts past Tsimikas to reach the byline, slides the ball across the six-yard box. Endo makes a heroic tackle to prevent Madueke from tapping in at the back post, but the ball rebounds to Van Dijk on the goalline and the Liverpool defender boots a clearance into Quansah’s thigh, with the ball rebounding straight into the net! A comedy of errors!
54 min: Chalobah is the next into the book, both for tripping Jones and for preventing Liverpool from taking a quick free-kick.
52 min: Groands from the Chelsea fans as Jackson is caught offside from a Madueke pass. It’s not clear if they are annoyed at the late timing of the latter’s pass, or Jackson’s errant run. Maybe both.
50 min: Van Dijk is given a yellow card for a late tackle on Lavia, with the Chelsea player receiving some stud marks on his white boots. VAR did double check to see if the booking should be upgraded to a red, but Van Dijk’s foot was deemed to be sufficiently low. Yellow is correct, in my book.
47 min: Madueke, operating on Chelsea’s left wing today, has done his best work when he has come inside Alexander-Arnold, rather than go outside on his favoured left. The Chelsea winger dances past two tackles and squares the ball to Jackson, who shoots weakly at Alisson.
Peeeeeeeep!
We’re back underway at Stamford Bridge. Both sides are unchanged, which is a little surprising (for Liverpool).
Half-time reading:
Half-time: Chelsea 1-0 Liverpool
A big goal for the Blues, who will go level on points with Newcastle in fourth place, if things stay like this. Here’s the live table.
45 min: One minute added on for stoppage time. This half has flown by.
CHELSEA GOAL DISALLOWED!
43 min: All alone in the Liverpool penalty area, Jackson receives the ball with his back to goal, lays off nicely to Madueke and the England international goes around Alisson and taps the ball into an empty net! But replays confirm that Jackson was offside from the initial pass, the Chelsea striker should really have done more to stay onside, he was looking right down the line.
41 min: Palmer finds a nice pocket of space on the right side of Chelsea’s midfield and releases Neto and the winger slaloms right and left before cutting inside Tsimikas and shooting low into the near side netting. Had that been inside the post, I don’t think Alisson was getting there!
