Little cheer in red or blue in season of disappointments 

DEADLOCK: Chelsea's N'Golo Kante with Liverpool's Ibrahima Konate and Curtis Jones. Pic: Adam Davy/PA Wire.

WHAT a difference a year makes.

This time last season, Liverpool’s visit to Chelsea was one of the most hotly anticipated matches of the Premier League season, and it did not disappoint. The streets around Stamford Bridge were buzzing with anticipation, the scarf-sellers and scalpers were doing a roaring trade, and the game did not disappoint.

Two of the best teams in Europe, brimming with brilliance and going for glory, went toe-to-toe in an enthralling game that gave us four goals before half-time, one of them a goal-of-the-season contender when Mateo Kovacic volleyed home an unstoppable shot from 30 yards.

Fast forward 15 months and things could not be more
different. Neither side are in danger of relegation, but oh how the mighty have fallen.

Chelsea started the day in the bottom half of the table playing under their third manager of a desperately disappointing season. 

Liverpool, humiliated by Manchester City at the weekend only a few hours before Aston Villa took all three points home from Stamford Bridge, but are hardly having a tilt at the title themselves, sat in eighth before kick-off and with little to play for but a forlorn hope of finishing fourth.

No wonder the procession down from Fulham Broadway tube station had the atmosphere of a funeral rather than a festival of football. There were not many takers for those scarves bearing the images of Pierre Emerick
Aubameyang or Hakim Ziyech, two of Chelsea’s mega-money superstar forwards who could not even manage a place on the subs’ bench despite their team struggling for goals.

Saturday’s 2-0 defeat by Villa was Chelsea’s fourth home defeat where they have failed to score. Since their goalless draw at Anfield two months ago, the Blues have drawn blanks in five of their 10 games.

For all the money — over €650m — that Todd Boehly and Behdad Eghbali have spent since taking over last May, the one area that needed addressing most has been neglected. 

Chelsea simply do not have a prolific striker, no-one to follow in the fine goalscoring tradition of Jimmy Greaves, Bobby Tambling, Kerry Dixon, or Didier Drogba. 

Kai Havertz has been used as the central striker by Thomas Tuchel, Graham Potter and now interim head coach Bruno Saltor, but the German has the languid body language of Trevor Brooking rather than the battering ram approach of, say, Diego Costa.

Havertz is capable of some lovely touches but he too rarely puts the ball into the net. Three moments last night illustrated the point. A great cutback from Ben Chilwell gave him an early chance to sidefoot past Alisson from close range, but he chose instead to try to flick the ball past the Brazilian keeper, who saved his weak wafted shot.

Later, finding the ball on his feet 15 yards from goal, he steadied himself for a low drilled shot but dragged it wide of the far post. And when he did put the ball in the net, five minutes after the break, he used his arm to propel it forwards after his initial shot had been saved by Alisson.

His team-mates were just as wasteful. Kovacic, one of Chelsea’s better performers, took the ball past Alisson but hit it against Ibrahima Konate in front of goal. Joao Felix, so silky in the middle third, repeatedly lost his composure in and around the penalty area, shooting high, wide and not so handsomely.

Reece James, another rare hit among the missers, struck a beautiful volley past Alisson only for Enzo Fernandez to undo the good work by being offside.

Fortunately for the Blues, the Reds were no better. Jurgen Klopp made wholesale changes from the side that City beat, dropping Mo Salah, Virgil Van Dijk, Trent Alexander-Arnold, Cody Gakpo Andy Robertson among others. The problem was that their replacements were not upgrades. Liverpool did not manage a shot on goal until first-half stoppage time, and then, as is said about London buses, three came along in quick succession. All were repelled.

Klopp sent on Salah and Gakpo after an hour or so, but things hardly improved.
Saltor, who had made only two changes from the Chelsea side that lost to Villa and cost Potter his job, tried to liven up his attack by sending on

Raheem Sterling and Mykhailo Mudryk, but Chelsea looked similarly unlikely to make a breakthrough.

When the fourth official held up his board to indicate five minutes of added time, fans started streaming out. Perhaps they’d heard there was a freshly painted wall worth going to watch, or more likely they were hoping to make the final hour before closing time in the local pubs and bars.

Either way, they would be drowning their sorrows, and the overwhelming mood at the final whistle was neither anger, joy nor sorrow — simply a sense of ennui.