A blog of two halves

Twin piques

The Blues head to Lancashire on Sunday for a tricky away fixture at an ancient ground surrounded by stunning hills.

22 October 2018
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Ross Barkley of Chelsea (right). PICTURE: GETTY IMAGES

The Blues head to Lancashire on Sunday for a tricky away fixture at an ancient ground surrounded by stunning hills.

Burnley's Turf Moor stadium is the kind of place where teams with unexpected unbeaten records can easily come a cropper.

Then again, when referees are prepared to fully compensate teams for opponents' time-wasting tactics, anything is possible.

Manchester United seemed certain to leave Stamford Bridge with three points last weekend, but man-in-black Mike Dean was alert to the Reds taking an age to make late substitutions and granted six minutes of stoppage time.

The Blues needed all of them to claw back a late, late equaliser via sub Ross Barkley, leading to the undignified baiting of Jose Mourinho by a grey tracksuited underling who should have known better.

Morrie Sarri is having to ring the changes in his team selection thanks to another Europa tie this week, but Barkley is getting back to full match fitness as well as full match confidence, and the board's confidence in signing him is being fully repaid.

Contrast that with poor Alvaro Morata, who left the pitch with his head hanging after being subbed yet again. It's just not clicking for the man who became a father of twins in July.

Since trading in his No9 shirt for No29 to mark the summer double, he's scored… you've guessed it… twice. Olivier Giroud may be preferred at Turf Moor.

The views expressed in this blog are those of the author and unless specifically stated are not necessarily those of Hammersmith & Fulham Council.

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Tim Harrison

Tim is our Chelsea FC blogger.

He also writes our Shepherds Bush Cricket Club match reports during the football close season.

Tim has been writing Chelsea match reports since the late 1980s for newspapers and, more recently, websites.

When he first reported on the Blues, the press box was a metal cage suspended over the lip of the old west stand - and you reached it via a precarious walkway over the heads of the fans.

But he has been a Chelsea fan since his father took an excited seven-year-old to watch Chelsea v Manchester United in the mid 1960s... and covered his ears every time the chanting got too ripe.

In July 2005 he wrote The Rough Guide to Chelsea, published by Penguin, which sold 15,000 copies.

His favourite player of all time is Charlie Cooke, the mazy winger who lit up Chelsea's left wing in the 60s and 70s.

When he isn't watching the Blues, Tim acts, paints, writes and researches local history.

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