Chelsea vs Atletico Madrid 2nd Leg of Champions League Match Report

Chelsea moved on to the Quarter Finals of the Champions League after beating top of La Liga Atletico Madrid 2-0 at Stamford Bridge with goals from Hakim Ziyech and Emerson with an overall win 3-0 on aggregate after an Olivier Giroud spectacular in the first leg.

However, VAR will still get the headlines for a stonewall penalty for a Cesar Azpilicueta pull on Yanick Carrasco inside the Chelsea box with VAR not checking and pulling the referee to look at the monitor. Chelsea then took the lead on the night one minute later, after summer signings Kai Havertz caught the La Liga side on the counter in the 34th minute, unleashing Timo Werner on the wing who centred the ball to Ziyech who scored after slotting the ball under Jan Oblak. Atletico Madrid was reduced to 10 men when Stefan Savic elbowed Antonio Rudiger in the 81st minute for violent conduct. Rudiger did make the most of the elbow, but VAR would struggle to overturn the referee’s decision because of Savic having a moment of madness and giving the referee a decision to make. Chelsea then put the final nail in the coffin in the 94th minute when Emerson came off the bench to finish another Chelsea counterattack sending Chelsea to the Quarter Finals of the Champions League, after a very complete performance from Chelsea over the two legs, keeping two clean sheets continuing Thomas Tuchel’s great start to Chelsea keeping them unbeaten across 13 games and only conceding 2 goals.

Tuchel is really getting the most out of his Chelsea squad after coming to the 2nd leg without Mason Mount who would be considered Chelsea’s best player this season both for Frank Lampard and Tuchel, and also Jorginho who both picked up yellow cards suspending them for the 2nd leg. But a Man of the Match performance from N’Golo Kante, who ran the show for Chelsea in midfield being everywhere for Chelsea and winning the ball which helped limit Atletico Madrid’s chances and sure up Chelsea’s defence helping Chelsea keep an 11th Clean sheet in 13 games under Tuchel.

Overall, across the two legs Chelsea were in complete control dominating the game and deserved to score more across the two legs, but Tuchel would be happy with the professional performance from his squad of players who really make a claim to be big contenders for the Champions League this season and make his Chelsea team someone no one would want to play in the Quarter Finals with the draw being made on Friday 19th March.