Chelsea lose... Referee wins..

Final Score: Chelsea 2-3 Manchester United 

English Premier League @ Stamford Bridge, 28th October 2012.

An experiment by the referee to send off FernandoTorres instead of giving him a free-kick, costs Chelsea dearly, and they lose to Manchester United at Stamford Bridge after a decade. The referee, wanting to display strongly his objection to diving, went wrong in the 69th minute, but not for the first time in the game. The fatal verdict backset Chelsea and there was nothing much for the 9-men Blues to do. All they could do was hope for a miracle. And it was depressing to see Mata being sacrificed and being substituted because of someone else's fault. The playmaker, the sole architect who usurped ManU of the lead through a brilliant free-kick, played a critical role in the making of the second goal too. Had Mata stayed in the field, there would have been more hope for Chelsea to strike back a goal out of nothing. 

The match was really a heavy-weight one, as the commentator said. Luiz's own goal and van Persie's presence of mind put ManU ahead by two goals to none by the 12th minute. A dejected performance from the Blues till the 35th minute was completely forgotten when the same individuals started a comeback as a different team, spearheaded by Mata's spot-kick goal. Ramires rose and headed the ball hard into the net past de Gea, and Chelsea got the equalizer they wanted. Hazard was impressive too, with his ball control and clear passes. But he failed to rise to the occasion when he had a nice chance to beat de Gea, but couldn't shoot the ball into the net, moments before Ivanovic was sent off in the 63rd minute for challenging from behind Ashley Young, who was comfortably advancing towards Petr Cech's box. Somewhere along the match ManU were relieved when Johny Evans accidentally deflected a Mikel cross towards ManU goal, and the ball hit the post and went out. 

ManU, for the past couple of years, seems to know one good secret that comes handy when they play against Chelsea. That is to provoke Chelsea players. And that was exactly what ManU guys did today. Ivanovic, Torres, Mikel, Luiz and Ramires claimed yellow cards not completely by their own effort - there was considerable effort from the ManU players too to provoke these Chelsea players to come down harsh on their opponents and get booked. And this kind of a security strategy worked well for ManU, because the players who were booked tried to play safe to avoid a second yellow. And it was unfortunate that, still, two of them had to be sent off. Luiz did a second big tackle towards the end of the game, but  he was spared of the second yellow because the referee would have been screwed by criticism, if he had chosen to send one more player off the field. 

And the deciding goal, by Hernandez was in fact offside. It was a very close call though, because only in replay it became clear that at the time when the pass was made, Cicharito was at least a feet ahead of Chelsea's last defender. Sir Alex Ferguson could claim that his choice of introducing Hernandez to exploit Ivanovic's send off gave him good returns. Mr. Ferguson and his lads can go home to Old Trafford, singing songs of praise on the referee. 

But the league, though moving to a closer contest than a one-sided one, is still open with more than three-fourths of the season's games still left.