Battle at the Bridge

As Sir Alex Ferguson said after he won his first European Cup in 1999 “football bloody hell”. Even though this game didn’t end as dramatically as that night at the Nou Camp, I’m sure he would have repeated similar words after his side won at Stamford Bridge yesterday after a pulsating encounter.

The match had everything. Would Rio Ferdinand shake Ashley Cole’s hand during the pre match? (He did), controversial decisions, goals, red cards, an injured steward and a complaint by Chelsea against referee Mark Clattenberg for allegedly using "inappropriate language" towards two of their players.

Manchester United began the game four points behind Chelsea and had not registered a league victory at the Bridge since 2002.

Chelsea made two changes from the team that lost their previous match to Shaktar Donetsk, Gary Cahill replaced the suspended John Terry and Edin Hazard came in for the injured Frank Lampard.

The visitors made four alterations from the line-up that came back from 2-0 down to defeat Braga 3-2 in their last match. Rio Ferdinand, Patrice Evra and Antonio Valencia were restored to the starting XI in place of Alexander Buttner, Shinji Kagawa and Darren Fletcher. While two goals hero against Braga, Javier Hernandez was unfortunate to miss out as Ashley Young made his first appearance since August.

The first two minutes set the trend of how entertaining this game would be as Robin van Persie (who on his last appearance on this ground scored a hat-trick) tested Petr Cech. The away side began the game confidently and took the lead on the forth minute when a Van Persie shot cannoned back off the post onto the unlucky David Luiz.

United deserved their goal advantage and eight minutes later they were 2-0 up, this time Van Persie’s  shot found the back of the net directly after a cut back from Valencia.

Chelsea got back into the game with a Juan Mata free-kick a minute before half-time, it was the Spanish international’s seventh goal in seven games.

The last incident of a breathless first half saw Fernando Torres booked for a high challenge Jackie Chan would be proud of on Tom Cleverley.

The second half didn’t start in the same frenetic manner as the first but burst into life in the 53^rd minute when Chelsea equalised. Oscar crossed for his Brazil team-mate Ramires to score with a rear header, the Bridge was rocking and the home team had all the momentum.
That changed on the 62^nd minute when Van Persie turned Cahill and put Young through on goal. Covering defender Branislav Ivanovic clipped the winger’s heels and was given a straight red card by Clattenberg, it was the correct decision.

However six minutes later it is debateable if the right call was made by the referee as he brandished a second yellow card to Torres for diving after he was 'fouled' by Jonny Evans, Chelsea had to play the remaining 22 minutes with nine men. Roberto Di Matteo shook his head in a state of disbelief and Torres remonstrated with the forth official as a left the pitch.

During his post match interview Evans admitted he made "a bit"of contact with Torres to bring him down however Torres made more than "a bit" of an imprint of stud marks on the chest of Cleverly in the first half and was lucky to be on the pitch in the first place.

After all the effort Chelsea made to come back from 2-0 down United were bound to make the extra space count and with 15 minutes left of normal time the inevitable happened but not without the controversy that followed the pattern of the game.

Substitute Hernandez scored the winner but was clearly offside when the ball was played across the Chelsea box by Rafael. As the United players celebrated, objects were thrown onto the pitch and a steward was injured in the aftermath of the goal.

After the game a Chelsea spokesman said that the club were "investigating all the incidents around at that time".

He added: "We have lodged a complaint to the Premier League match official delegate regarding inappropriate language used by the referee towards two of our players in separate incidents in today’s game."

For this weeks league fixtures, Clattenberg has been left off the referee's list as the Professional Games Match Officals stated that he is one of the "elite referee's in world football" but "the level of scrunity (surrounding him) would detract from the match and be unfair to the clubs and supports of both sides".

United took the points here but Chelsea have the chance to get a small bit of revenge in the Capital One Cup on Wednesday in the "Battle of the Bridge" part two. If that game is as dramatic as this one it will be more frightening than most sequels on Halloween night.