Huddersfield 3-1

Guardian:

Huddersfield 1 - 3 Chelsea

Chelsea bounce back with comfortable win over Huddersfield Town

Paul Wilson at the John Smith's Stadium

Conceding the title early can sometimes backfire, and it would have been easy to imagine Antonio Conte’s players lacking the appetite for a wet night in west Yorkshire after hearing their manager admit Manchester City might be uncatchable, yet in the event Chelsea played like champions.
Huddersfield were outclassed, indeed a little fortunate not to be embarrassed, once Chelsea got into their smooth, attacking stride. “The best team we’ve seem here all season” was one opinion expressed over the PA at half-time, which is quite a compliment considering City have already been to these parts and won.

Eden Hazard and Willian were the men Huddersfield found most difficult to pin down, though it was the visitors’ width and intelligent use of space that left the home side chasing shadows. The range and direction of Chelsea’s passing was almost unanswerable at times.
“To win like that will improve our confidence, I think my players enjoyed it,” Conte said. “Don’t forget that Huddersfield won against United and made City struggle. We are in a good patch, we have only lost one game in nine, but one team is going to be very difficult to stop. When a competitor wins 15 of 16 games it is not easy to keep thinking positive. It doesn’t mean we are going to stop trying, it just means I prefer being realistic.”

It took a while for Chelsea to adjust to the injured Álavro Morata’s absence. Hazard was only notionally operating as the central forward in the front three and after a cagey opening period it was a series of unforced errors in the Huddersfield defence that led to the first goal. First Mathias Zanka put his goalkeeper under slight pressure with an awkward back-pass, then Jonas Lössl slipped in the act of clearing the ball and only sent it 40 yards upfield to Victor Moses. The wing-back instinctively headed it back and the neatest of touches from Hazard supplied Willian.

From then on it was the slickness with which Chelsea exploited the tiniest amount of uncertainty in the Huddersfield defence that was impressive. Willian waited as Tiémoué Bakayoko set off on a curving run into space behind Zanka, then picked him out perfectly for the midfielder to complete an incisive move with a composed finish from a narrow angle. “A sloppy goal to concede when we were trying to frustrate Chelsea,” David Wagner, the Huddersfield manager, said. “We had to overperform and we didn’t.”
The knowledge that Chelsea could rip through them from virtually a standing start seemed to daunt the home side a little and they spent the rest of the first half in defensive mode. Hazard might have created something when he cut in from the left but there was no one in the middle to meet his inviting low cross, then when N’Golo Kanté had a shooting opportunity just before the interval his attempt from the edge of the area flew miles too high.

Bakayko also had a chance to increase Chelsea’s lead when he put a header narrowly wide from Willian’s free kick – Hazard’s trickery on the ball had exasperated Jon Hogg and Zanka to such an extent that the latter brought him down.
Huddersfield badly needed to reach the dressing room without conceding again, if only to regroup and regain their composure, and they fell short by a couple of minutes. César Azpilicueta hit a marvellous crossfield pass to find Marcos Alonso in space on the left wing, in so much space that looking up and picking out Willian for a free header in front of goal was almost a formality. While it was the type of goal that looked as if it ought to have been defended better, the sheer accuracy of Chelsea’s passing was giving Huddersfield little time to react.

The home side could even have turned round three goals in arrears but for Lössl doing well to save from Pedro after Hazard had given his fellow forward a clear sight of goal. In the circumstances the pitchside announcer’s joke about Chelsea having earned their half-time hot-water bottles fell more than a little flat. “What should we do now?” the former manager Peter Jackson was asked on the pitch during the break. “Panic,” he replied. “We’ve got to try and make the Chelsea goalkeeper make a save.”

That sentiment was still true five minutes into the second half, when Pedro atoned for his earlier profligacy by extending the lead to three. Once again Alonso had found space to cross from the left, Chris Schindler failed to gain anything like enough distance with his clearance and Pedro rifled the loose ball high into the net.
Tom Ince did bring a save from Thibaut Courtois after an hour, before Hazard’s last act of the evening was a backheel that should have resulted in another goal for Pedro, but he could not keep his effort on target.
That was about the extent of Chelsea’s generosity until the substitute Laurent Depoitre headed Florent Hadergjonaj’s cross past a furious Courtois in the final seconds of stoppage time, but if Huddersfield had hoped to catch Chelsea on an off-night they were sadly mistaken.

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Huddersfield 1-3 Chelsea: Tiemoue Bakayoko, Willian and Pedro strike as Antonio Conte's side tame the Terriers and get back to winning ways

Chelsea put their West Ham defeat misery behind them by beating Huddersfield at the John Smith's Stadium
The visitors broke the deadlock on 23 minutes, Tiemoue Bakayoko capitalising on a poor clearance to score
Willian doubled the lead just before half-time, heading home Marcos Alonso's cross at the back post
Four minutes into the second half Pedro made it 3-0, curling an effort in from the edge of the area
Laurent Depoitre snatched a very late consolation goal in the final seconds of the contest

By Chris Wheeler for the Daily Mail

Antonio Conte may have given up the Premier League race, but there is some fight left in this Chelsea team yet.
Through the wind and the rain, they turned what threatened to be a very difficult night into something of a procession.
After a shock defeat by West Ham at the weekend led Conte to surrender the defence of their crown, this was more like it. They were three goals up inside 50 minutes without a recognised centre forward, and the result was never in doubt after that.

It is unlikely to have leaders Manchester City glancing nervously over their shoulders. Nor was it the kind of performance to strike fear into their Champions League opponents Barcelona. But this was the ideal response for a frustrated Conte, who went on an angry rant against the club’s critics after the game.
Missing Alvaro Morata through injury, the Italian recalled Willian and Pedro to support Eden Hazard in attack and they were simply too much for a disappointing Huddersfield. Tiemoue Bakayoko, hooked at half-time against West Ham and criticised for his performances since a £40million summer move from Monaco, went a little way towards answering his critics by scoring the first goal and completed 90 minutes for the first time in seven games.
‘Maybe I saw the best performance from Baka tonight,’ said Conte. ‘He’s adapting and I’m very happy for him.’

Willian headed the second and Pedro claimed the third, with Hazard causing more than his fair share of problems. Substitute Laurent Depoitre’s injury-time goal for Huddersfield made no difference whatsoever.
The home side contributed to their own downfall on a night when they could, and should, have made life far more uncomfortable for Chelsea.
‘We were a little bit sloppy,’ said manager David Wagner. ‘You have to be at your best in terms of focus and concentration if you want to get things out of games with top teams. When you concede the third goal just after half-time, it can be a horrible night against a team like Chelsea but we managed to stay in the game. Unfortunately we were not good enough.’
Chelsea started brightly enough in difficult conditions that only worsened as the half wore on and contributed to the first goal in the 23rd minute.

Huddersfield goalkeeper Jonas Lossl slipped as he cleared the ball downfield and Victor Moses headed his wayward pass back to Hazard. The Belgian flicked the ball to Willian and he laid it into the path of Bakayoko, who had set off down the left channel.
The Frenchman accelerated into the box and as Lossl raced off his line, a lovely, clipped finish beat the keeper. It was already going in as Chris Lowe attempted an acrobatic clearance as he raced back towards his own goal, but succeeded only in touching the ball over the line with his right thigh and falling face-first into the net.
Two minutes before half-time, Cesar Azpilicueta switched play with a long pass out to the left, and Marcos Alonso took one touch before swinging a cross to the edge of the six-yard box, where Willian was unmarked to beat Lossl with a downward header.
Pedro went close to a third before the interval when Lowe’s stray pass was intercepted, but Lossl came out and spread his body to make the block.
The Spaniard wasn’t to be denied, however, and struck five minutes after the restart.

Again the cross came from Alonso, and this time Willian caused problems by tangling with Christian Schindler. The ball ran loose to Pedro, who steered it home from 15 yards. Game over.
Thibaut Courtois was finally called into action when Tom Ince pushed the ball past the Chelsea defence and raced through to meet it first.
The Belgium goalkeeper had read the danger and came off his line to block Ince’s effort with his right arm, and Andreas Christensen headed the ball away for a corner. When that was cleared by the visitors, Zanka tried his luck with a 25-yard shot that swerved over the bar.
Conte was comfortable enough to send on 17-year-old debutant Ethan Ampadu to play in central defence, and it wasn’t his fault that Huddersfield sprang into life in the final minutes.
Depoitre pulled a goal back with the last action of the game, beating Courtois with a fantastic header from Florent Hadergjonaj’s cross, but it mattered little. Chelsea were home, if not so dry.
Conte’s side had demonstrated that they can still play like champions, even though the title seems to be heading elsewhere.

HUDDERSFIELD (4-4-1-1): Lossl 5.5; Smith 5, Jorgensen 5, Schindler 5, Lowe 5 (Hadergjonaj 67, 6); Kachunga 5, Hogg 5 (Whitehead 46, 6), Williams 6, Ince 6; Mooy 6; Mounie 5.5 (Depoitre 74, 7)
Subs not used: Coleman, Cranie, Van La Parra, Quaner
GOAL: Depoitre 90+3
Manager: David Wagner 5

CHELSEA (3-4-3): Courtois 6; Azpilicueta 7, Christensen 8 (Ampadu 80), Rudiger 7; Moses 6.5, Kante 7 (Drinkwater 71, 6), Bakayoko 7.5, Alonso 7; Willian 8.5, Hazard 8 (Batshuayi 69, 5.5), Pedro 8
GOALS: Bakayoko 23, Willian 43, Pedro 50
Subs not used: Caballero, Fabregas, Musonda, Cahill
Manager: Antonio Conte 7

Ref: A Marriner 7
Att: 24,121