That’s all for now. Thanks as always for following along with us and do check back later for a full match report.
- Burnley weather fightback to shock nine-man Chelsea in London
- Clarets score first league victory over Blues since 23 April 1983
Sat 12 Aug 2017 12.04 EDT
First published on Sat 12 Aug 2017 09.00 EDT- Full-time: Chelsea 2-3 Burnley
- GOAL! Chelsea 2-3 Burnley (David Luiz, 88 min)
- Chelsea's Cesc Fabregas is sent off
- GOAL! Chelsea 1-3 Burnley (Morata, 69 min)
- Half-time: Chelsea 0-3 Burnley
- GOAL! Chelsea 0-3 Burnley (Vokes, 43 min)
- GOAL! Chelsea 0-2 Burnley (Ward, 39 min)
- GOAL! Chelsea 0-1 Burnley (Vokes, 24 min)
- Chelsea's Gary Cahill sent off (14 min)
- The teams!
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- Full-time: Chelsea 2-3 Burnley
- GOAL! Chelsea 2-3 Burnley (David Luiz, 88 min)
- Chelsea's Cesc Fabregas is sent off
- GOAL! Chelsea 1-3 Burnley (Morata, 69 min)
- Half-time: Chelsea 0-3 Burnley
- GOAL! Chelsea 0-3 Burnley (Vokes, 43 min)
- GOAL! Chelsea 0-2 Burnley (Ward, 39 min)
- GOAL! Chelsea 0-1 Burnley (Vokes, 24 min)
- Chelsea's Gary Cahill sent off (14 min)
- The teams!
A stirring fightback from the undermanned league champions falls short, but leaves a far better aftertaste for Chelsea supporters than what might have been if they’d bowed 3-nil. A note from reader David Rathborne, via email:
That wasn’t the sound of Chelsea being booed by their own fans at half time, that was the sound of the home fans booing the referee. With good reason. And that’s the sound of Chelsea fans applauding their team off at the final whistle, despite having lost, followed by booing of the referee.
Full-time: Chelsea 2-3 Burnley
There’s the whistle and Burnley have completed a famous victory at Stamford Bridge and only their second win over Chelsea in the league in more than 40 years. Gripping theater, this Premier League!
90 min+4: Burnley aren’t just sitting back and running out the clock. Just now Heaton tries to pick out Vokes with a through pass, but the timing is just off and Vokes is ruled offside.
90 min+2: David Luiz goes down near the halfway line and it’s a free kick to Chelsea. Charly Musonda replaces Andreas Christensen, Chelsea’s third and final substitution.
90 min: The Burnley free kick is cleared and Chelsea are on the counter once more. The fourth official signals for four minutes of added time.
89 min: Rudiger shown yellow for a foul on Vokes and Burnley will have a free kick from a dangerous position.
GOAL! Chelsea 2-3 Burnley (David Luiz, 88 min)
And David Luiz runs onto a flick from Morata and pounds it into the back of the goal. Chelsea are down to nine men with only a few minutes left but they’re not done yet!
87 min: Alonso goes down in the area, a bit too easily to be honest. Nothing from the referee, correctly.
85 min: Morata has a go from outside the box but the shot, while on target, doesn’t have the power required to challenge the keeper.
Chelsea's Cesc Fabregas is sent off
81 min: And Chelsea are down to nine men after Fabregas is sent off for a challenge on Cork with a second yellow. He was booked in the first half for dissent.
78 min: Kantes shot from the right side of the area is blocked. Moments later David Luiz is shown yellow, apparently for protesting to the referee.
77 min: Arfield is shown yellow for a rough challenge on Alonso.
75 min: It’s going to be a double substitution for Burnley. Scott Arfield comes on for Johann Berg Gudmundsson, while Jonathan Walters replaces Steven Defour.
73 min: Christensen appears to score for Chelsea ... but the flag is up! Upon further review, it looks as if Morata was offside when he took the final touch before the ball went over the line, which it would have done anyway. Had he left it, it would be Chelsea 2-3 Burnley with more than 15 minutes to play.
GOAL! Chelsea 1-3 Burnley (Morata, 69 min)
The Blues pull one back as Burnley are caught sleeping a bit. Willian floats a cross across the area toward Morata, who sneaks behind his marker and heads it into the goal.
63 min: Another chance for Chelsea, this time by Alonso, whose left-footed shot is blocked. Moments later Ben Mee is given a yellow for an overzealous challenge on Morata.
61 min: Signs of life for Chelsea! Marcos Alonso takes the free kick and pounds a left-footet bolt toward the top-right corner. It’s saved by a fully extended Heaton, but only just. Corner for Chelsea.
60 min: Robbie Brady is shown the yellow card for a hard foul at the hour mark, Burnley’s first booking of the year.
58 min: Chelsea make their second substitution of the match as Alvaro Morata comes on for Michy Batshuayi.
55 min: Hendrick wins a free kick off a hard challenge by Fabregas, who’s already on a yellow. The referee sprints up and the crowd swells nervously. Fortunately, he’s spared a sending off and Chelsea will continue with 10 men.
51 min: Chelsea win a corner, only their second of the day, but nothing comes of it. They’re on the attack again moments later as Alonso carries it into the area from the left side. He looks to cross but it caroms off a Burnley defender back toward him. The crowd and Alonso cry for a handball and the replay does confirm it struck the lower-shoulder area. Alas, no call.
49 min: Rudiger has a go but misses the target. Moments later Fabregas finds Alonso, whose left-footed shot from outside the area is parried away. Surely that was Chelsea’s best chance of the match.
46 min: We’re off and running again in the second half with no changes for either side. Almost immediately, Kanté wins a free kick in the defensive half.
A sampling of your thoughts from an interesting first half at the Bridge.
Alix, via email:
Must disagree with Prateek Chada. The champions being humiliated at home on opening day by a mid-table team shows “the system” is working perfectly.
No matter how you spend you still can’t be sure of buying a title, even in this day and age.
Robbie Borowczyk, via email:
Just had an image flash up in my mind of Mourinho sitting in a lotus position in front of his TV having just found his Nirvana...
David Francis, via email:
What’s Neymar’s buy-out clause?
Half-time: Chelsea 0-3 Burnley
That’s the sound of the defending champions being booed off the pitch by their home fans at half-time of the season opener. Chelsea won 19 of 21 matches across all competitions at Stamford Bridge last year while Burnley took a scant seven points away from Turf Moor all season. So naturally the Clarets lead 3-0 in this one. Bear in mind: Burnley have only beaten Chelsea in league play once in the last 40 years: back on 23 April 1983 when both sides were in the second division.
45 min+2: Vokes wins a free kick on a David Luiz foul. A subsequent shot misses the mark and that should be the last kick of the half.
45 min: Chelsea finally win their first corner of the match. Nothing comes of it. The fourth official signals for three minutes of injury time.
GOAL! Chelsea 0-3 Burnley (Vokes, 43 min)
A surreal opening here at Stamford Bridge as Chelsea go three down inside the first 45 minutes. This one started with Jeff Hendrick winning a free kick on the right flank. Defour took the kick and found Vokes in the center of the area, who made no mistake in heading it past the keeper.
GOAL! Chelsea 0-2 Burnley (Ward, 39 min)
Cork picks out Ward on the left side of the area, who carries it toward the goal before uncorking a left-footed shot from a tight angle past the keeper. A peach of a strike and Chelsea find themselves two goals down and a man down at home against a side that finished in the bottom five last year.
36 min: Ten minutes from half-time and Chelsea are still looking for their first shot on target.
33 min: A good spell of possession now for the Blues but they aren’t able to generate a shot from it before it’s given away and Burnley are on the counter.
28 min: Burnley keeping the pressure on after their surprise opener, winning a corner. Nothing comes of it and moments later the goal-scorer Vokes is whistles for a foul on Fabregas in the Chelsea half.
GOAL! Chelsea 0-1 Burnley (Vokes, 24 min)
Lowton crosses into Vokes, who pounds a right-footed shot from the middle of the area into the bottom-left corner for the opener! Welly welly well!
21 min: Prateek Chadha checks in via email.
This game is the perfect illustration of how “there is no value” in the transfer market and how FFP is a joke. Surely there is something wrong with a system thay lets Chelsea spend 70 million pounds to buy Morata to warm the bench and that too while not needing to even move Costa out. (And lets be clear that he has been benched as Batshuayi has been preferred after a full pre-season).
18 min: A first substitution for Chelsea as Andreas Christensen replaces Jeremie Boga.
16 min: Now Fabregas has been shown a yellow for what appears to be sarcastic applause to the referee, who’s lost control of proceedings a bit early on.
Chelsea's Gary Cahill sent off (14 min)
14 min: And Gary Cahill is sent off for a reckless studs-up challenge of Steven Defour directly in front of the referee. Chelsea are down to 10 men with less than 15 minutes on the clock! Looked a bit harsh to be fair.
11 min: Rudiger has a go from outside the area and it’s deflected away.
10 min: Willian surges up the right side into the area and chips a cross toward Boga, but the Ivorian is whistled for a foul.
6 min: A bit of a slow start for the Blues but they’ve kept possession for a spell here, building up slowly from the back before a long ball over the top winds up in the hands of the Burnley keeper.
3 min: Burnley win a free kick. It’s floated toward the far post in the general vicinity of Ben Mee, but he’s unable to get a head on it. Chelsea’s Marcos Alonso is shown yellow for a hard challenge.
1 min: And they’re off! Burnley attacking from left to right in white shirts and claret shorts, Chelsea from right to left in traditional all-blue strips.
The teams have taken the field at Stamford Bridge and we’re moments from kick-off. We’ll take it over with minute-by-minute coverage from here.
The teams!
Hello and welcome to today’s match between Chelsea and Burnley at Stamford Bridge. Antonio Conte’s men are out to open their title defense on the right foot and will be favored to do so against a Burnley side in the top flight for a second straight season for the first time since the 1970s.
Kick-off is just under a half hour from now. Here’s a look at today’s teams.
Chelsea
XI: Courtois; Rudiger, Luiz, Cahill; Azpilicueta, Kante, Fabregas, Alonso; Willian, Batshuayi, Boga
Subs: Caballero, Christensen, Tomori, Kenedy, Scott, Musonda, Morata
Burnley
XI: Heaton; Lowton, Tarkowsi, Mee, Ward; Cork, Defour; Gudmundsson, Hendrick, Brady; Vokes
Subs: Taylor, Arfield, Westwood, Walters, Pope, Long, Barnes
Bryan will be here shortly, in the meantime here’s what Gary Cahill had to say about the Blues’ title defence:
Gary Cahill has suggested Chelsea will have to rely on keeping players fit this season if they do not add to their depleted ranks.
Antonio Conte’s side, deprived of the injured Eden Hazard and with new signing Tiemoué Bakayoko sidelined after knee surgery, looked short of resources during their Community Shield defeat to Arsenal on Sunday and Cahill was not the only person to notice the squads listed in the Wembley programme showed Chelsea could potentially select from 17 fewer players than their opponents.
Cahill suggested Chelsea will need to avoid further injuries if they are to challenge on all fronts. “I don’t know, the back of the programme was interesting,” he said when asked whether the squad appeared small to him. “But in terms of quality we’ve certainly got that and you just have to hope we don’t have too many injuries. The new players that have just come are going to be vitally important for us and the quicker they settle the better but there’s no doubt we have added quality to the team.”