Antonio Conte bemoaned two points dropped as his side drew 2-2 with Swansea. Diego Costa gave the Blues a half-time lead, and for close to an hour they looked on course for a win. A Gylfi Sigurdsson penalty levelled the scores, before Leroy Fer scored two minutes later. Costa grabbed a second to rescue a draw, but the manager was disappointed in their failure to kill the game off.
Conte started with an unchanged side from the win over Burnley. The two deadline day signings, David Luiz and Marcos Alonso, were forced to watch on from the bench. Both were made to wait on their debuts, as Chelsea kept the same back five for the fourth league game in a row.
Early on it looked like the Italian had made the right choice, as Costa put them in front after 18 minutes. Oscar picked up the ball in the box after the Swans failed to clear. The Brazilian had time to turn and lay the ball off to the forward, who found the bottom corner from the edge of the area. A 1-0 lead at half time was well deserved, but the Blues failed to find a second despite 14 first half shots.
Everything changed just shy of an hour, when Thibaut Courtois rushed out to deal with a ball over the top. The keeper reached it after Sigurdsson, and ended up bringing the midfielder down. The former Tottenham man stood up to take the resulting penalty, making it 1-1.
Within two minutes the Swans were ahead. Gary Cahill was bundled over by Fer, who was then free to run at goal. Fer’s shot came off Courtois’ leg, but it rolled in to give the hosts a 2-1 lead.
The Blues have hit plenty of late goals so far, they’d scored in the last 10 minutes of each league game so far. Costa grabbed his second of the afternoon with an overhead kick. He was alive when a clearance hung in the air, and his shot cannoned in to the net off Federico Fernandez.
Despite the controversy, the manager put blame on his own players first, “We had a fantastic reaction to going behind and for this reason I am pleased with my players,” he said. “But I also want to tell them that in this game if we have the possibility to kill the game, then we must kill it. We must learn this.”
However, the Italian didn’t shy away from criticising the officials, “I think everyone can see the tackle on Cahill was a foul, there was a great mistake by the referee, but I also want to say that this can happen for one side or the other and I don’t want to complain because it is a reality.”
Next up for Chelsea is a clash with Liverpool at Stamford Bridge on Friday night.
LCN Man of the Match: Diego Costa