Shevchenko seizes Chelsea chance

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  1. CelticKing

    CelticKing The Green Monster

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    Shevchenko seizes Chelsea chance</p>

    <div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'></p>

    LONDON (AFP) - Andriy Shevchenko capped a rare start with an even rarer goal as Chelsea earned an unconvincing 2-0 win over Sunderland here on Saturday.

    The Ukrainian, handed his chance in the absence of the injured Didier Drogba, headed home in the 23rd-minute before Frank Lampard sealed victory with a second-half penalty.

    An ultimately routine victory moved Avram Grant's side to within three points of the top of the Premier League, although his team did little to warm the hearts of their fans at a wet and cold Stamford Bridge.

    Sunderland hardly sparkled themselves and unless Roy Keane's side, who finished with 10 men after Liam Miller's sending-off, acquire more firepower when the transfer window reopens relegation looms large.

    Chelsea, meanwhile, have their own problems to contend with.

    Drogba's absence may not have cost them on this occasion but Grant - for all that his team are now unbeaten in 15 games - can hardly have been encouraged by this shot-shy performance.

    They will, however, have to find a way of coping without their talismanic forward. Ivory Coast international Drogba underwent surgery on Saturday on a long-standing knee problem and it is anticipated that he will not return until January at the earliest.

    The decision suggests Drogba - who had wanted remedial work to be carried out as soon as possible to aid his chances of playing in next month's African Nations Cup - won the battle of wills with his club, although Chelsea claimed an operation became essential once the 29-year-old's knee locked on Friday.

    Perhaps the only man in Chelsea blue grateful for Drogba's absence was Shevchenko.

    The former European player of the year has been a peripheral figure since Grant's appointment but the chance to impress against lowly opponents appeared tailor-made to pep his confidence.

    So it proved. Shevchenko was hardly dynamic but a rare league goal, just his second of the season, suggested he had not lost all his old qualities.

    It was Salomon Kalou, however, who shone the brightest. The Ivorian is an eccentric character, superb one week and clownish the next, but he illuminated the first half.

    He almost headed Chelsea in front in the fifth minute when he crashed Joe Cole's corner onto the crossbar, but consolation arrived soon enough.

    After controlling Frank Lampard's chipped pass, Kalou took one glance to check his options and, seeing Shevchenko storming into the six-yard box, picked him out with an inch-perfect cross. His team-mate could hardly miss.

    But Chelsea then appeared to be lulled into complacency by their visitors' lack of ambition - it took Sunderland 32 minutes to muster an effort on target - and the half duly dwindled to a close.

    The interval failed to shake Chelsea out of their lethargy and, minute by minute, Sunderland grew in stature. Their wild shooting might have reduced the home goalkeeper Carlo Cudicini to the role of an uninterested spectator, but at least Keane's team struck their passes more purposefully and moved with more urgency.

    The Wearsiders might even have been harbouring faint hopes of a comeback when their chances were dashed by a defensive indiscretion.

    Danny Higginbotham's 75th-minute tug at Alex, as the Brazilian attempted to convert an inswinging free-kick, was spotted by referee Peter Walton and Lampard converted the penalty with ease.

    Sunderland were beaten and their misery was complete in the 88th minute when Miller was sent off for pushing Claudio Pizarro in the face.</div></p>
     

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