Three points with as minimal effort as possible. We played poorly and Man City thoroughly deserved a draw for their spirited display. Unfortunately, we never looked like scoring whereas Man City was always dangerous when they had possession. If they had little more quality, we might have been finished off tonight. Chelsea did not play top gear football. They know that more matches are coming up. They had to keep themselves fit and they got to win with as little effort as possible, which they did with clinical precision.

For the whole of the first half we had just one shot on goal and they had 5 shots and this sums up the story. We did not attack at all. We did not set up any chances and in the final third we could not even string two passes. It appeared as if we knew that we had the three points in our pocket, even before the start of the match. On the other hand, Man City gave all they had, and only they looked like winning this match or interested in scoring goals.

Jose started with Maka in the midfield as it is Essien’s turn to be out injured. Essien suffered a knee injury in the Spurs match that ruled him out of this match. Too many players played very poorly tonight – Makelele, Geremi, Kalou, Robben & Ballack. Of them all, Ballack was the worst and did not hold, did not pass but did foul unnecessarily, did lose the possesssion – in short it was a nightmare. Kalou and Robben came very close to matching Ballack’s horror show. I do not expect too much from Ballack anymore and I know Kalou is on the learning curve. The maximum disappoint for me was Robben’s performance. Geremi is too limited and he does not offer too much variety. Diarra is way above Geremi. Makelele was off-colour, nothing special, not even some decent moments.

There are some who took the extra burden of making up for the poor performance of their colleagues – Lampard, Carvalho, Cole. Carvalho was superb with his typical interceptions. While Terry was limping quite often and Geremi not upto the mark, Carvalho had to step up to take the charge. Cole had a good game too and nullified the Man City attacks at an earlier stage. Most of the Man City attacks were from their left wing, which is a good testimony of Cole’s game tonight. Lampard was very much in the action. He was everywhere – in attack, in defence and in midfield. His penalty was one of the best taken penalties I’ve seen.

[video]http://www.dailymotion.com/swf/4wJPiWLCwlhfxac3M[/video]

The points gap between Man Utd and Chelsea comes back to 6 points. In all probabilities, we should win our weekend home fixture against Sheff United while Man Utd host Bolton. For quite some time we have been waiting for Man Utd to drop points and they have been very resolute in their approach. This Saturday, it will be another test for the Reds. Frankly, I dont expect Bolton to beat Man Utd at the Old Trafford but surely they have the team to earn a draw atleast. We should expect another lacklustre three-point effort by Chelsea this weekend as we gear up for the big match at White Hart Lane on Monday.