In the good old days of 2009, Guus Hiddink could call upon the likes of Frank Lampard, Didier Drogba and Nicolas Anelka to get his Chelsea team out of trouble - not that they were ever mired in the mediocrity that their 2015 successors find themselves wading through these days.
Diego Costa scores the first goal for Chelsea
It would have had a happier ending for the new Chelsea manager had Oscar, his occasionally brilliant but inconsistent Brazilian had not - with the score at 2-2 – sent a penalty heading for the concourse of the second tier of the Matthew Harding stand. That was a failure of monumental proportions but a victory would have been rather more than Chelsea deserved on another afternoon when they were well below the standards of last season.
Posession stats
There were two goals for Diego Costa, but also a booking for the striker, his fifth in the league this season, which means he will miss the game at Old Trafford on Monday. At least Hiddink had avoided defeat, which is a small consolation but a consolation nonetheless given this season’s issues. As for Watford, they have now taken 13 points from the last 15 and find themselves comfortable with the visit of Tottenham next week.
They started the game well and Chelsea’s first goal came in a spell when the visitors had the better of the game and really should have been in the lead themselves. Odion Ighalo had dragged a volleyed shot from Jose Jurado’s bouncing shot wide of the post in a split second when the Watford striker seemed to lose track of where the goal was.
Troy Deeney of Watford scores a penalty to make it 1-1
He put a header wide five minutes later, a chance which came straight from a corner and generally Chelsea looked as directionless as they had for long periods at the end of the Jose Mourinho days. After a good spell at the start of the game Hiddink’s players had too much time without the ball, and too much time chasing it ineffectively.
Chelsea manager Guus Hiddink before the match
Watford passed around them easily enough and Ben Watson and Etienne Capoue looked comfortable in midfield. Then, from a Willian corner, John Terry headed the ball downwards, it flicked off Gary Cahill’s back and Costa spun quickly to volley the loose ball past Heurelho Gomes.
There had been no booing of the striker from the home fans this time, or at least too little for it to be audible. This was just his fifth goal of the season, his first since the home win over Norwich City on Nov 21 and he celebrated like a man who had proved some kind of point.
Chelsea attacking thirds
Hiddink had made a low-key entry, resisting the request from the club’s on-pitch announcer Neil Barnett to come out onto the pitch to wave to the fans. The new manager performed a little bow by his bench and sat down. He had Eden Hazard fit again but chose to keep the winger on the bench and go with the same side that beat Sunderland the previous weekend.
Odion Ighalo scores Watford's second
Watford’s equaliser was a confidently taken penalty from Troy Deeney four minutes before half-time after a very avoidable handball from Nemanja Matic when a corner was floated over from the right side. You do wonder how much the midfielder can see from behind the mask he has to wear to protect his fractured nose. His misjudgement was so blatant that referee Andre Marriner barely had a protest to deal with.
Watford attacking thirds
Hiddink took Cesc Fabregas off at half-time, a decision that would have been hard on the pride of the Spanish midfielder but difficult to argue with. He had struggled to influence the game and in his place, Jon Obi Mikel could at least be relied up on to put a foot in when required.
Even so, Watford struck first, a heavily deflected shot from Ighalo off Cahill’s heel that set Thibaut Courtois on precisely the wrong direction. Unfortunate? Perhaps, but a natural consequence for a team that simply fails to put enough pressure on the ball.
Diego Costa levels the score for Chelsea at 2-2
It looked bleak for Chelsea at that point and their revival showed that character does lurk within this team of fallen champions. It was Willian’s perfectly angled ball from the right that found a corridor through Watford’s defence and Costa took one touch to take it wide of Gomes and struck it with his right foot the other side of the goalkeeper.
The Chelsea bench react to Oscar's miss
The introduction of Hazard for Pedro with 15 minutes of the game left had a quick return when the winger was crudely fouled by Watford substitute Valon Behrami right in the far corner of the area where no such challenge was required. The less said, from Chelsea’s point of view, about Oscar’s ensuing penalty, well over the bar, the better. Mikel had the last shot of the game but if that gone in, it truly would have been a miraculous Christmas for Chelsea’s new manager.
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