Chelsea v Fulham: An opinion

In the hours since yesterday's match at the Bridge ended I've been struggling to work out exactly how I feel. Am I elated that we performed well or disappointed that we failed to make the most of, arguably, our best ever chance of beating our nearest rivals on their own patch.

After watching the highlights - repeatedly - I think a draw was a fair result. Both teams had great chances to take all three points, and while we can bemoan the fact that Konchesky and Kamara failed to capitalise late on, it's only fair to acknowledge Chelsea came very close too.

It was definitely our best performance at Stamford Bridge since we were promoted to the Premier League in my opinion. We hustled for everything, defended superbly and, eventually, brought the best out of Petr Czech who is a world-class goalkeeper.

Starting from the back then... For the first time this season I felt we had someone between the sticks who was confident, and more importantly, had the confidence of his defenders. This is something we've been badly lacking with Niemi in the side.

Our defence played very well against arguably one of the world's best strike forces. Yes, there were times when Chelsea broke through. Kalou turned Baird inside out on one occassion and Joe Cole managed to get some dangerous crosses past Konchesky, but generally we were solid.

Baird, in particular, visibly grew in confidence as the game progressed and made some fantastic challenges. Bizarrely, this wasn't enough to stop him coming under fire from some quarters of the crowd - to my utter disbelief - but I will save that for a later post.

In midfield, Smertin played like his life depended on it and Simon Davies was absolutely everywhere. He must have run miles...back in defence one minute, attacking the next, falling back to break up a Chelsea attack, spreading balls about....he was outstanding.

Sadly, the only area in which we were disappointing was up front. How typical it is that the first match all season that we manage to keep a clean sheet is also the first one in which we fail to find the back of the net!

Healy was kept very quiet, Dempsey played with characteristic aggression but didn't make much impression really and could have done better with his headed chance in the opening exchanges. Kamara fluffed his lines after coming on and Bouazza was okay but arrived too late to make much of an impression.

However, the worst player on the pitch in white was Seol Ki-Hyeon which came as a huge surprise to me. Maybe it's just a lack of match fitness, but he was slow, lumbering and generally lacklusture. His one or two nice touches were totally overshadowed by the negatives and he should have been replaced by Bouazza far earlier.

All in all it was a performance of which the players can feel proud. They battled hard and we were only a whisker away from recording our first victory at the Bridge since 1979. Next year eh?