Regular viewers to Chelsea's FA Youth cup games will be well used to the excitement, drama and good football that was served up on Wednesday night. In a tough hard fought game Chelsea's young lads fought back from a 2 - 0 deficit at half time to come out 3 - 2 winners at the end of extra time and will face either Barnsley or Stevenage at home in the next round.
Given the strength in depth available to Adi Viveash the team selection was always going to be something of a headache, which is always a nice problem to have. Missing from the game against Colchester but back for this game was influential youngster Jeremie Boga and relative new boy Andreas Christensen to the defence.
The first half of the game was something of a disaster for Chelsea, passes were going astray all over the place, biggest culprits being Fankaty Dabo, Adam Nditi and John Swift. Our key players like Islam Feruz, Jeremie Boga and Ruben Loftus-Cheek were not having an impact on the game and Charlton were pressing hard and playing at a high tempo. 2 goals were shipped in the first half without reply and things were looking pretty dire but we have been here before and most people will have believe that Adi would get them playing much better in the second half.
At half time Viveash rang the changes, he brought on Alex Kiwomya and shifted the team around. Nathan Ake went to centre back and Christensen moved to right back Loftus-Cheek and Swift played as the 2 sitting midfielders and Boga moved in the 10 spot from playing on the wing. The changes and the team talk had the desired impact, the team was playing much better and keeping Charlton on the back foot. The first goal came from a brilliant run down the right wing from Christensen, the ball went to Feruz whose shot hit the post and the keeper and Christensen was following in to be able to tap it in.
The pressure was now all Chelsea and Viveash tinkered with the team again to go for the win. Off came Swift and Nditi and on came young players Hunte and Colkett. Now Chelsea were playing with 3 at the back Ake on the left, Davey in the center and Christensen on the right, Baker dropped in to play alongside Loftus-Cheek in front of the defense and then a 4 of Hunte, Colkett, Boga and Kiwomya were behind Feruz.
The equalizer came from a break out of defense and Loftus-Cheek spotting the run of speedy Alex Kiwomya played a lovely ball between the defense and Kiwomya sped away to slot the ball home with a tidy finish. After that it seemed just a matter of time before Chelsea got the goal to win the game but unfortunately it did not come during normal time and extra time was to be played.
In extra time the pattern of play was much the same, Chelsea pressing for the winner and Charlton having worked extremely hard in the first half looked a spent force. Finally the big chance came, again a ball out of defense found Connor Hunte whose first touch was sublime to take him away from his defender and he sped away to then slot the ball through the legs of the Charlton keeper. Chelsea then tightened things up and was able to see out the game without too much drama.
Again another inspired comeback from this Chelsea Youth Cup team but a lot of the credit has to go to the manager Adi Viveash, this is what you can do when a manager has the knowledge and trust in his players to change things up and go for the game. Having said that he will be asking his players to not repeat the first half performance in later rounds.
Again there was some very good performances on the night, most notably Lewis Baker who was at the heart of everything good and was all over the park putting in a true captains performance.
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