If you’re going to go, go big — and Batshuayi went big in the 82nd minute here. Just at the point when it looked as if we would all have to reconvene at Stamford Bridge on Monday, he arrived in West Brom’s six-yard box to ensure the title race is concluded with more than a week to spare.
That is no small achievement in the season that brought Pep Guardiola to the Premier League, Jose Mourinho to Manchester United, and saw Tottenham older, more experienced and ready to improve on last season’s attempt to chase down Leicester.
That Mauricio Pochettino’s team came up short again is due, in no little part, to the traits we saw in Chelsea on Friday night. Resilience, determination, organisation and some of the finest passing and most fleet-footed forward play in the league.
Chelsea are worthy champions, Antonio Conte a worthy winner of the Premier League in his first season as coach. Impressively, he has solved Chelsea’s perennial problems: how to move on from John Terry and Branislav Ivanovic; how to rebuild team spirit after a calamitous campaign a year ago.
He has made a solid citizen of David Luiz, dealt skilfully with high-maintenance stars such as Diego Costa and Eden Hazard, turned Victor Moses into a right wing back and unleashed Cesc Fabregas just at the right time, his radar helping close out the season.
Indeed, right until the last, Conte got it right. At £33million from Marseille, Batshuayi has been one of the transfer flops of the season. Yet, with nothing working, and West Brom growing stronger — Nacer Chadli almost gave them the lead late in the game — Conte was not scared to introduce him as a late substitute, or withdraw Hazard, who had run himself into the ground, even in defensive service.
And the title was his reward. If you’re going to score your first in the league since August 20 against Watford, it might as well win the league. With the game heading for a draw, Hazard off and West Brom at last exerting pressure, there was a degree of tension as we entered the final straight. Well, as much tension as there can be when a team needs one win and still has Watford and Sunderland to play at home.
Enter Batshuayi. He took advantage of the defensive reorganisation caused by the withdrawal of Gareth McAuley, after West Brom had failed to deal with a sliced shot that went into no-man’s land. Chelsea recycled it, Cesar Azpilicueta crossed and Batshuayi slid in to poke the ball past Ben Foster.
Cue lunatic celebrations. Cue much sliding in all corners of the pitch. Batshuayi went first, again, down by the corner flag. So did Luiz into the arms of Azpilicueta. On the bench Conte leapt on to his staff with such abandon he may have suffered a cut lip.
This was Chelsea, showing the drive that has got them where they are this season. This was Conte, passion overflowing, showing how a first season in English football can be done. Batshuayi’s signing may have been a rare error, but who will remember that now?
When the final whistle blew, Conte went round his team, jumping at them in the style of one of those impassioned meetings on railway platforms. Arms and legs wrapped around, catch me. The players responded by giving him the bumps. Then John Terry.
Yet, digressing slightly, now the dust has settled, do you know for whom this game looked very bad news? Pep Guardiola. West Brom must visit Manchester City on Tuesday with Guardiola still not certain of a place in the Champions League next season, and as Tony Pulis’s players demonstrated, they take pride in their end of season cussedness.
It would have been easy for them to coast here, easy to let Chelsea take the expected three points and the title with scant resistance. Albion have little to play for, after all. They are a very credible eighth but, in reality, top of the bottom. They defended as if their existence depen-ded on it, almost scored after 23 seconds through Salomon Rondon and looked just the sort of team that would delight in frustrating Manchester City.
The reason Chelsea have won a fifth Premier League title, was on show even in moments of greatest frustration. It was all there. The exquisite passing and vision of Fabregas; the delightful touch and poise of Hazard; fine saves when needed by Thibaut Courtois, including one in a part of the game when many contemporaries may have been taken by surprise; a great saving tackle by Luiz; the width; the counter-attacking; the speed of recovery.
All that was missing was player of the season, N’Golo Kante, still recovering from injury and on the bench, and striker Diego Costa, who was present in name only for much of the game. He was the one disappointment.
Yet he has been magnificent on other occasions, and any player can have an off night. His team-mates made up for it. Intense, eager, willing to get the job done at the first opportunity.
Chelsea’s biggest problem was accuracy. They had plenty of shots, but few that challenged Ben Foster. Most of the chances were crafted by the boot of Fabregas. Had the forwards found their range it could have been done much earlier but West Brom, whose draw at Tottenham proved so decisive last season, are nothing if not awkward.
Physical, too. James McClean was lucky his night did not end prematurely having received a yellow card for taking out Moses after 20 minutes. He did it again soon after and was fortunate Michael Oliver decided to be lenient. The home fans moaned anyway, but they didn’t have a case. The best team won, the match and — more importantly — the league.
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