BLUES ARE ON A KAI MOUNT AND MENDY HIGH AS MAGIC STEAL THE SHOW
KAI HAVERTZ got the goals but Chelsea’s victory owed every bit as much to the performances of Mason Mount and Edouard Mendy as it did to the goalscoring German. Mount, as is so often the case these days, was the beating heart of just about everything Thomas Tuchel’s side did well going forward.
While Mendy was unflappable at the back and pulled off three saves that started out at very good and got progressively better.
Tuchel was obviously pleased with the goals Havertz scored and his all-round display, but Mount was the man for whom the Blues boss reserved the most special praise.
“He is the full package,” he said. “Mentally-wise, talent-wise and physically. Most importantly his character – he has both feet on the ground.
“He comes to Cobham every day to learn something, he is a guy who can recover fast, a physical player and has fully adapted to Premier League football.
“It is a pleasure to have him and a pleasure to be at his side to support him. He is a guy who likes the sport and feels obligated to make the most out of it.”
It was Mount’s utterly delightful piece of skill in plucking the ball out of the air and the perfectly weighted pass which followed that set up Havertz for his first.
And the German tucked his finish away nicely to deliver a real blow to Fulham, who had started brightly.
They continued to make chances despite Chelsea’s dominance after their opener and Mendy did well to keep out Antonee Robinson, Ademola Lookman and Ola Aina.
And when Havertz made it two with his fourth goal of the season early in the second half, those saves from the Frenchman looked even better.
This time Timo Werner was the man with the assist, taking the pass from Havertz and waiting for his compatriot to make his way into a goalscoring position before slipping the ball right into his path.
Tuchel added: “Kai took his chance and this is what we need from him all the time.
“He was fully committed and he has given his manager a headache for the next game.”
Havertz, naturally, was delighted to be the matchwinner.
He said: “It felt good to score the early goal so it gave me a little bit of confidence.
“It’s always good to score and I’m very happy to help the team. I hope I can continue against Real Madrid onwednesday like this.”
Wednesday’s Champions League semi-final second leg against Real was prominent in the minds of everyone at Chelsea and this could hardly have been a better preparation for it given they didn’t expend too much energy and didn’t suffer any injuries.
And they also tightened their grip on fourth spot and their Champions League hopes for next season.
Tuchel added: “It’s the perfect match and the boys take a lot of credit from the coach for this.
“You can get easily confused in between two big matches and if you look at the table and see Fulham at the bottom you can get confused because they are stronger than their
position suggests. So it was absolutely necessary we played with focus and accepted the challenge.”
As for Fulham, they couldn’t handle the challenge from Chelsea and slowly but surely are walking their way closer to the edge of the plank.
They are all but down now and Scott Parker knows it will take four wins from four to stand any chance of staying up.
He said: “We’ll try to go and win four games now.
“I’m proud of the performance. Chelsea are a top side and we knew the challenge we faced.at certain moments we probably lacked in certain areas.
“But winning four games is exactly what we have to do – there is no other option for us now.”