Hamburg defeat Chelsea 2-1
Chelsea faced another disappointing result in their pre season tour. The 2-1 defeat against Hamburg makes it the second defeat against a German side; earlier, they lost to Eintracht Frankfurt by the same score on Sunday. All three goals in the game came from defensive errors. The champions do not look too convincing in their pre season matches, and it has made many ask if reinforcements are needed, following the departure of Joe Cole, Michael Ballack, Deco and Juliano Beletti.
Heung Min Son, the Hamburg substitute ensured a win for the German side in the last few minutes of the match when he effortlessly beat Ricardo Carvalho and scored pass Turnbull. Turnbull is the third choice goalkeeper for Chelsea; first choice keeper, Petr Cech is out with an injury and Henrique Hilario and Ross Turnbull have replaced him. Both of them were not at all impressive as they conceded 2 goals against Frankfurt and Hamburg, respectively.
Even though things started well for The Blues, with Michael Essien setting up the goal, which Frank Lampard scored effortlessly; Essien was one on one with the goal keeper, Frank Rost, and had a chance to score, but the Ghanaian unselfishly passed it to Lampard, who tapped it into the empty net. The Chelsea attack did not last long as the Germans responded to the early goal by almost scoring.
Chelsea then brought Didier Drogba on; his first match after his successful hernia operation. Drogba wasted no time as he partnered with Nicolas Anelka to cause the Germans problems. The Ivory Coast hit man was in excellent form despite not featuring for Chelsea since the end of the Premier League. He slipped the ball to Anelka, only to have Anelka shoot straight at the keeper. Anelka did manage a goal shortly afterwards, but his goal was ruled as offside.
The Hamburg star player, Mladen Petric came close to scoring quite a few times. He had an opportunity to equalize when a flicked corner came towards him, but he could not convert the shot, and ended up diverting it in the wrong side of the post from only six yards. However, the Croatian striker finally scored, capitalizing on a defensive error by Zhirkov. Zhirkov made the fatal decision of passing the ball back to Turnbull, but he misjudged the distance and Petric intervened, scoring on his first attempt.
Essien had a good chance of giving The Blues the lead again, with a header on Malouda’s corner, but he could not time his header and sent the ball over the bar instead of the back of the net. Chelsea could not recover from that, and were dealt another blow when John Terry failed to intervene and Heung min son beat Carvalho to score Hamburg’s second. The second goal came with only four minutes remaining on the clock and Chelsea could not score another goal. A loss in this match makes three consecutive losses for the London side, which is not very encouraging ahead of Sunday’s clash against runners up, Manchester United.
Ancelotti had put forward a strong side, which was strengthened further by the return of Didier Drogba. However, they have failed to produce results yet again. Chelsea started with Turnbull in goal, who has once again failed to impress. Paulo Ferreira took his spot as right back, and even though he was one of the better players, he was replaced by Jeffrey Bruma in the 67th minute, to give the youngster some playing time. Ivanovic started with Captain John Terry, but was replaced by Carvalho after the first half. Terry and Carvalho’s defensive partnership is considered one of the best in the Premier League, but the duo made some poor decisions and tackles, one of which earned Terry a yellow card, the only one in the match.
Ashley Cole, who has been linked with Real Madrid, started and was replaced by Zhirkov in the 61st minute. This change might have cost Chelsea the match as it was Zhirkov’s bad decision that led to one of the goals. Essien, who promises to be a regular in the Chelsea side this season, remained on for the entire 90 minutes and deserved to be the Man of the Match. Not only did he set up Lampard’s goal, but he also came close to scoring himself, missing by a few inches. Lampard went off in the 61st minute, to give newcomer, former Liverpool player, Yossi Benayoun a chance to impress. Kalou, who seemed to be invisible throughout his 45 minutes of the pitch, made way for Drogba.
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