From Kante to the kids, winners and losers as Chelsea beat Huddersfield

Chelsea beat Huddersfield Town 3-0 to give Maurizio Sarri a winning start as manager of the Blues.

In a tense first half, Chelsea took the lead through N’Golo Kante after a quick counter-attack and Jorginho doubled their advantage just before half-time from the penalty spot.

And Pedro wrapped up the scoring 10 minutes from time to give Sarri his dream start in the Premier League.

Here are the winners and losers from the match.

Winner: N’Golo Kante

With the arrival of Jorginho, Maurizio Sarri and Sarrismo, N’Golo Kante will find himself in a slightly more advanced position at Chelsea this season.

And in the first game of the season it brought some reward with the French World Cup winner scoring the opener against Huddersfield.

N'Golo Kanté has scored in each of his four Premier League seasons:

2015/16: 37 games, 1 goal
2016/17: 35 games, 1 goal
2017/18: 34 games, 1 goal
2018/19: 1 game, 1 goal

Already equalled his best single-season tally. pic.twitter.com/WPvreV8vjW

— Squawka Football (@Squawka) August 11, 2018

After Antonio Rudiger won an aerial battle inside his own half, Jorginho’s neat touch played in Pedro who pushed forward before passing to Willian.

Willian’s cross to the back post was testing, and there was Kante to half-volley in for just his third Premier League goal for Chelsea – scoring one in each of his three seasons.

Kante is already recognised as one of the better midfielders in Europe for his ability to appear in many places at one time defensively. But under Sarri, the Frenchman may just find himself honing the attacking part of his game.

And this will be an added benefit for the 19.8% of fantasy football users who picked Kante for their 15-man squads, despite the Frenchman’s previously low points return.

Loser: Alvaro Morata

Things just aren’t working out for Alvaro Morata at Chelsea at the moment.

New manager Maurizio Sarri has clearly put his faith in the Spaniard, not signing a new striker in the summer and allowing Michy Batshuayi to leave on loan to Valencia.

But the Spaniard just looked a yard off pace from the start with slopping passing and some poor first touches.

Even as Chelsea grew in the game and took the lead, Morata looked slightly lost in the attacking line as Willian and Pedro opted to cut in from their wide positions.

And when the crosses did come in, Morata could not get himself on the end of them, being crowded out well by the Huddersfield defence.

The striker needs a goal to get his confidence up or both he, and Chelsea, may suffer.

Winner: Jorginho

It appears this season that Jorginho may just be one of Chelsea’s most important players alongside the likes of Kante and Eden Hazard.

After a slow start to the game for his side, which saw David Luiz playing long balls as opposed to passing through the midfield, Jorginho started to take control of his team-mates.

And that was when Chelsea grew into the game, with the Italian getting a feel of the opposition and exposing their weaknesses with quick, smart passes in short passes as he did so well at Napoli.

After playing a small, but important, part in the build up for Kante’s goal, the Italian scored his first for his new club from the penalty spot after Marcos Alonso was failed.

Undisturbed by the pressure and jeering of the Huddersfield fans, Jorginho calmly dispatched his penalty with a skip before striking the ball – a technique some at Chelsea will have already seen in their pre-season shootouts.

Jorginho also misplaced just four of his 66 attempted passes, recording an accuracy of 93.9% – the best of any player to start the match.

Loser: Ross Barkley

Ross Barkley did not have a bad game against Huddersfield but he also did not make the most of one of the few competitive opportunities he may have to show his worth.

The man signed from Everton in January had performed so well in pre-season as the attacking part of Sarri’s midfield trio and would have fancied himself to be a regular starter once competitive football returned for Chelsea.

But on the final day of England’s summer transfer window, Chelsea confirmed the loan-signing of Mateo Kovacic from Real Madrid as part of the deal which saw Thibaut Courtois go the other way.

Once Kovacic is up to speed with Chelsea and their new system, the Croatian is expected to occupy that third role in midfield alongside Kante and Jorginho, as a fitting replacement for Marek Hamsik whom Sarri had at Napoli.

This will mean Barkley may once again find himself sitting on the bench at Chelsea, fighting with Ruben Loftus-Cheek for a spot as Kovacic’s back up.

Winner: Terence Kongolo

For the opening 30 minutes of the match, Chelsea barely troubled the Huddersfield defence and that was largely down to the impressive performance of Terence Kongolo.

Kongolo initially joined the Terriers on loan for the second half of last season and performed well enough at the back for Huddersfield to make him their record signing this summer.

Forming part of a three-man central defence which switched to five when Chelsea were attacking, Kongolo helped keep Alvaro Morata, Pedro and Willian quiet.

And even when the Blues attack did work their way through, Kongolo was there to provide some brilliant last-ditch tackles to keep the pressure off Ben Hamer in the Huddersfield goal.

Unfortunately for Huddersfield and Kongolo, Chelsea managed to score twice before half-time which stretched the defence. But things do look bright at the back for the Terriers.

Loser: Chelsea’s young players

With Eden Hazard not a guaranteed starter due to his involvement late into the World Cup, many Chelsea fans were hoping Callum Hudson-Odoi would feature in some part after his impressive pre-season.

But the 17-year-old was left out of the matchday squad altogether, with Pedro and Willian starting out wide and Hazard and Victor Moses the options from the bench.

There was also no place in the squad for Ethan Ampadu, another young player to have impressed in pre-season, and Tammy Abraham who Sarri looks to have chosen as their third-choice striker ahead of Batshuayi.

But with a good start to the season so vital for Sarri at his new club, it is understandable why he wanted to rely on more senior players as David Luiz also started over Andreas Christensen in central defence.

The post From Kante to the kids, winners and losers as Chelsea beat Huddersfield appeared first on Squawka News.

From Squawka NewsSquawka News https://ift.tt/2w15Ozh