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MOTD: Swansea City 2-2 Chelsea

By on September 11, 2016

Swansea City awoke the beast. They poked and prodded and kicked Diego Costa, who carries the nickname “El Cholo” from his days at Atletico Madrid, in hopes of provoking the violent outbursts that marred his last league campaign. This time around, however, Costa took out his revenge in the run of play, scoring a brace to salvage a draw on a raucous night in the South of Wales.

Costa was at the center of the fray in a topsy-turvy affair at the Liberty Stadium, drawing a trio of yellow cards from Swansea defenders over the course of the ninety minutes and many more challenges that went unpunished — notably, an elbow in the back from Jordi Amat.

The Spanish striker already has four goals this campaign, a total which took him until Boxing Day to reach last season and is reveling in his preferred role of pantomime villain under new manager Antonio Conte.

Conte’s defensive-mastermind gamelans usually come at the cost of the energy and intensity that makes the Premier League so entertaining to watch, but Swansea upset the balance of play with a rapid second-half comeback after Costa’s early opener. Two lapses of concentration at the back cost Chelsea their perfect start to the Premier League and puts serious pressure on centerback Gary Cahill with the impending introduction of deadline day signing David Luiz. Although the decision may never have been in doubt, Cahill’s error surely booked Luiz a debut against Liverpool next week.

Chelsea had thoroughly dominated the first half, putting Swansea on the rails after opened the scoring in the fourteenth minute. The Swans fluffed multiple attempts at clearing their lines in a crowded penalty area and the ball fell to Costa, who stroked a sublime finish bottom corner of the net from the edge of the box.

He should have had another towards the end of the half when he burst ahead of his marker to convert Willian’s corner from John Terry’s tap-on, but skewed an awkward shot back across goal when it seemed easier to score.
In an unusual move, Swansea coach Francesco Guidolin made an attacking substitution on forty-one minutes in the hopes of breathing some life into his team, almost an apology to the home crowd for their dour start.

The adjustments seemed to work as Gylfi Sigurdsson drew a penalty from goalkeeper Thibaut Courtois on the other side of the half and coolly converted from the spot. Leroy Fer completed the comeback within three minutes, catching Cahill dallying on the ball and tucking a low finish past Courtois.

If anything, though, the turnaround had happened too quickly for Swansea. Chelsea had a half hour to mount a formidable push for an equalizer and after Conte realigned his array of firepower up front, the Blues pulled level ten minutes from time. Ivanovic cut into the middle from the right and saw a driven effort blocked off the line, but Costa was on hand at the far post to strike the rebound out of the air and into the back of the net with a bicycle kick.

Costa would have had a third but for a fine stop from Łukasz Fabianski, and although these were the first points that Antonio Conte’s men have dropped at this early point in the season, they can draw solace from the rejuvenation of their main man up top.

Homepage photo credit: CFCUnofficial [CC BY-SA 2.0], via Wikimedia Commons

About Alex Morgan

Alex Morgan, founder of Football Every Day, lives and breaths football from the West Coast of the United States in California. Aside from founding Football Every Day in January of 2013, Alex has also launched his own journalism career and hopes to help others do the same with FBED. He covers the San Jose Earthquakes as a beat reporter for QuakesTalk.com and his work has also been featured in the BBC's Match of the Day Magazine.