Evening Standard
·4 October 2024
Evening Standard
·4 October 2024
Blues’ attacking stars deliver in opening European victory
Chelsea beat Gent 4-2 to begin their Europa Conference League group-stage account with three points at Stamford Bridge.
Goals from Renato Veiga and Pedro Neto had the Blues 2-0 up before Tsuyoshi Watanabe headed in to make things interesting on 49 minutes.
Enzo Maresca’s side regrouped, though, with Christopher Nkunku and Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall adding goals three and four.
Omri Gandelman scored a second for Gent in the 90th minute, but Chelsea were already home and hosed.
Dom Smith was at Stamford Bridge to rate the Chelsea players’ performances…
Filip Jorgensen 6
Beaten by a fine header. Everything else he had to do was routine.
Axel Disasi 7
A lovely raking ball assisted Neto after the break. Played well at right-back.
Tosin Adarabioyo 6
Strong in the air and positive with his choices of pass. Slowly growing into life at Stamford Bridge.
Benoit Badiashile 5
Caught on his heels a couple of times. Composure on the ball better than his defending.
Renato Veiga 7
Netted his first goal for the Blues. Besides one or two lapses in concentration, delivered a positive attacking display.
Renato Veiga headed Chelsea in front
Chelsea FC via Getty Images
Misplaced passes and one very poor effort on goal made this an evening to forget for the young Italian. A talented player who needs more game time in this competition.
Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall 7
Lively all night. Scored the fourth and could have added a fifth soon after. Created the opening goal.
Pedro Neto 7
Netted a thumping volley and that raised his level for the final half an hour. Good performance.
Joao Felix 6
Not the catalyst in Chelsea’s attack this time, but always offered himself and had a few nice forays forward.
End product is still his biggest issue, but assisted the opening goal and demonstrated his pace by constantly trying to beat full-back Hugo Gambor - and succeeding.
Christopher Nkunku 6
A bit of a peripheral figure, often isolated from the rest of the team. But took his goal confidently.
Subs:
Marc Guiu (Nkunku, 80’) N/A
Tyrique George (Neto, 80’) N/A
Not used: Sanchez, Bergstrom, Cucurella, Colwill, Fernandez, Madueke, Caicedo, Dyer