Late Surge Pushes Chelsea to UCL Road Win

Fernando Torres and the Blues blanked Nordsjaelland 4-0 (AP Images)

After an opening match draw at home vs Juventus Chelsea traveled to Denmark to take FC Nordsjaelland, the Danish champions.  The Danes pushed Chelsea hard for nearly 80 minutes before the Blues finally broke the match open and cruised over the finish line.

Chelsea fans were perhaps right to be nervous after the defending European champions gave up a two goal lead at home to Juve, but the Blues got off to a pretty good start in this one.  In the early minutes Oscar sent a cross into Danes' area, and a Nordsjaelland defender headed it off his own bar while trying to clear the ball away from a lurking Victor Moses.  Then in the 10th minute Juan Mata connected with Frank Lampard, but Lamps sent the Spaniard's cross just over the crossbar.   Fernando Torres forced a save out of the Nordsjaelland 'keeper in the 22nd minute, and the Danes looked to have successfully weathered the early storm.

However in the 33rd minute the Danes turned the ball over to disastrous effect.  Torres took the ball off Enoch Adu and dished to Lampard.  Lamps hit Mata in the center of the area and he was able to slot the ball into the goal to give the Blues the 0-1 lead.

Early in the second half Torres had a chance to but the Blues up another goal, but the Nordsjaelland 'keeper barely beat him to another nice ball from Oscar.  Then in the 53rd minute The Danes dodged another bullet as Moses scored, but his goal was correctly ruled out for a foul.

Nordsjaelland fought well though, and their efforts nearly paid off with an equalizer late on.  In the 73rd minute Joshua John sent a low shot in on Petr Cech's goal, and Chelsea 'keeper just barely managed to save the ball, parrying it off the near post and away from danger.

The Blues finally put some distance between themselves and the home side on 79 minutes.  Torres earned a free kick just outside of the area when he was fouled by Michael Parkhurst.  David Luiz stepped up over the free kick and smacked a gorgeous right footed kick in off the left post to make it 0-2.  Then just three minutes later Mata got his second of the match after he drilled home a ball that deflected off of a defender.  Finally in the 89th minute Oscar dropped a little ball off to Ramires, who tapped home Chelsea's final goal of the night to make it 0-4.

The three points put Chelsea top of the group after Juve drew with Shaktar in the other Group E match from today.