Reece James’ stoppage-time free-kick rescued some extent for Chelsea after a scintillating 2-2 draw with Bournemouth at Stamford Bridge.
Andoni Iraola’s aspect had been heading for a well-known victory after second-half objectives from Justin Kluivert and Antoine Semenyo had cancelled out Cole Palmer’s early opener.
Bournemouth had been heading for fifth, degree on factors with Chelsea, however James produced a second of magic within the fifth minute of stoppage time to raise the roof off Stamford Bridge and rescue some extent for Enzo Maresca’s aspect.
The guests had been the shape aspect coming into the sport, unbeaten in a club-record eight Premier League video games. Nonetheless, Chelsea, who hadn’t gained in 4 matches within the league, began stuffed with confidence and took the lead with Palmer pulling the strings from the off.
After being talked about in 10 of the primary 14 posts in Sky Sports activities‘ minute-by-minute commentary, Palmer lastly had his purpose and it got here after some sensible ahead play from Nicolas Jackson. The striker held the ball up earlier than turning his man and enjoying Palmer in on purpose. Confronted with Mark Travers, Palmer offered him a dummy, placing the Bournemouth stopper on the deck, earlier than rolling the ball into the web for his 14th league purpose in 21 appearances.
Bournemouth barely had a kick within the first half however they roared again within the second to depart Chelsea, who missed a number of possibilities, reeling.
It was breathless stuff as Bournemouth got here out with renewed vigour and so they had been rewarded right away when Moises Caicedo barged over Antoine Semenyo within the penalty space. Referee Robert Jones pointed to the spot and Kluivert made no mistake to deliver the guests degree.
Then got here the sport’s controversial second.
All Bournemouth’s good work may have been undone when David Brooks cynically took out Marc Cucurella off the ball. Cucurella had performed much like Brooks within the early phases of the sport, and the Bournemouth ahead remembered the incident. The referee was despatched over the display by VAR however fortunately for Brooks, he brandished a yellow card.
It was the primary time within the Premier League {that a} referee has rejected a red-card evaluation on the monitor and it was the primary monitor rejection of any type this season.
Bournemouth went on to take full benefit as Antonie Semenyo’s rocket of a shot flashed previous goalkeeper Robert Sanchez to ship them on their approach to what they thought was going to be an enormous win, however substitute James had different concepts.
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