Chelsea 4-2 Brighton: Palmer’s historic four goals but Maresca’s side lack control

Cole Palmer became the first Premier League player to score four goals in the first half of a game as Chelsea won an entertaining and breathless match against Brighton & Hove Albion at Stamford Bridge.

The victory is Chelsea’s fourth in their last five in the league, continuing a positive start for Enzo Maresca.

The Athletic’s Liam Twomey analyses the key talking points from a Blues perspective…

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This is just what Cole Palmer does

Jogging along in front of the silenced Brighton fans in the Shed End, Palmer greeted his fourth goal in 20 first-half minutes at Stamford Bridge the same way he responds to seemingly anything: with a nonchalant, slightly mischievous grin.

It is unlikely he knew he had made Premier League history as the first player to score four goals in a first half, but it would not have changed his reaction. This is simply what he does, and Brighton were the latest victims of his ruthless brilliance. Such a record seemed to belong in the realm of fantasy when Palmer raced onto an Enzo Fernandez through ball in the 19th minute, with Brighton leading 1-0, and steadied himself before beating the advancing Bart Verbruggen with a clipped shot that bounced off the far post and away to safety.

But the best goalscorers have short memories. Palmer had the ball in the net barely a minute later from a virtually identical move, only for the assistant referee’s offside flag to be validated by a VAR check. Two minutes later, Nicolas Jackson gave him his easiest chance of the game, taking out Verbruggen with a square pass that allowed him to slot into an empty net.

From there began the 20-minute stretch in which Palmer bent the action to his will, converting a typically nerveless penalty after Jadon Sancho had been brought down and then curling a sublime free kick into the top corner from 25 yards. By the time he locked eyes with Sancho, darted diagonally onto the winger’s precise pass and lashed a shot in at the near post, even many of the Brighton fans were too awestruck to react.

It could have been even more. Palmer missed two great chances to add to his tally in the second half, while Jackson wasted several presentable opportunities to earn him assists. He will need to make do with just the 10 (ten!) direct goal involvements from his first six Premier League appearances this season, reinforcing his status as Chelsea’s talisman.

https://twitter.com/TheAthleticFC/status/1840039795541647773?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw

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Chelsea can’t keep getting dragged into basketball games

After a season when so many matches descended into transitional chaos under Mauricio Pochettino, it is nice to see Chelsea finally controlling games under Maresca… (don’t worry, the sarcasm is light-hearted).

Chelsea are struggling to maintain the possession stranglehold Maresca is looking for, but we are still in the early weeks as the head coach looks to integrate a new style of play. There have been enough flashes of individual quality and collective coherence to be optimistic.

More significantly, few teams could control a game when the opposition set up as Brighton did here. Fabian Hurzeler set up a five-man (and sometimes six-man) pressing unit to harass Chelsea in their own defensive third, with a four-man defence stationed permanently on the halfway line.

Brighton’s approach entirely dictated the terms of engagement in a ludicrously open first half. Twice their suffocating pressure yielded Chelsea mistakes that led to goals, but almost every time the home side managed to play through or around the visiting swarm they almost immediately found themselves clean through on goal, often in numbers.

Chelsea experienced something similar away at Tottenham Hotspur last season, though Ange Postecoglou’s insistence on having his nine men play an offside trap on the halfway line transformed that game into something even weirder. Pochettino had to patiently guide his young players to the right answers that day. No such hand-holding was required this time around.

Jackson, Noni Madueke and Palmer generally timed their runs in behind the Brighton defence well — even the offside calls were close — and the passes seeking them out were quick and accurate. When they bore down on goalkeeper Bart Verbruggen they were not especially clinical, but clinical enough to expose the folly of Hurzeler’s strategy.

In the long term, Maresca does not want to see his team regularly dragged into the football equivalent of a basketball game, but maintaining momentum is paramount. Against a team as chaotic as Brighton, a win secured by superior firepower is sometimes the best-case scenario.

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Sanchez errors crank up the pressure

Three minutes into stoppage time at the end of the first half, an unexpected cheer went up in the Matthew Harding Stand. Having taken a few moments to consider his options, Robert Sanchez had decided to go long from his goal kick and the relief of that alone was too much for the Chelsea supporters behind him to hold in.

Sanchez’s performances had been improving but the goalkeeping game is brutal. Mistakes linger far longer in the collective memory than saves or calm passes under pressure, and Sanchez’s biggest flaw has always been his consistency — at times technical, at times psychological.

His first error against Brighton compounded several others that had preceded it.

Moises Caicedo played Levi Colwill into trouble in his own box, and the defender’s attempted clearance was then deflected up in the air by Carlos Baleba. At that moment, Chelsea’s giant goalkeeper saw Georginio Rutter towering over Marc Cucurella and made the costly decision to come for a ball he could never claim.

His second error was far worse, and more in line with the others that have undermined Chelsea supporters’ faith in him: a loose first-time pass into a dangerous central area, pounced upon by Baleba ahead of Caicedo and immediately turned into an infuriatingly easy goal.

Sanchez has the faith of Maresca, and summer signing Filip Jorgensen has not done much in his outings to suggest he should play instead, but Chelsea have two goalkeepers who expect to be first choice. That means weekly pressure, and it will only grow with every error that Sanchez makes.

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What did Enzo Maresca say?

We will bring you this after he has spoken at the post-match press conference.

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What next for Chelsea?

Thursday, October 3: Gent (H), UEFA Conference League, 8pm BST, 3pm ET

Sunday, October 6: Nottingham Forest (H), Premier League, 2pm BST, 9am ET

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(Top photo: Darren Walsh/Chelsea FC via Getty Images)