Burnley 1 Chelsea 3
It turned out to be a deception. Burnley had taken the lead and, briefly, their supporters might have dared wonder whether they would be talking about Scott Arfield's goal in years to come with the fondness they reserve here for Robbie Blake's finest moment for the club. Then Chelsea snapped them out of their dreams, ruthlessly and brilliantly. It was pass-them-to-death football during that blitz of retaliatory strikes and, by the time they were done, Jose Mourinho's team had left the clear impression that the arrival of Diego Costa and Cesc Fabregas had already improved them.
Another team might have been badly affected by that early setback, in a strange environment, with an excitable home crowd. Mourinho's players simply rolled up their sleeves and set about turning the game on its head. Costa, with a debut goal, quickly settled their nerves. They took the lead four minutes later when Andre Schurrle finished off a wonderful exchange of passes and Branislav Ivanovic added the third before half-time. Fabregas was superb on his re-introduction to English football and there was a vibrancy to Chelsea's attacking that was not always evident last season.
They could be excused for slacking off in the second half because by that stage the game was effectively over as a contest and Burnley’s night had become an exercise in damage limitation rather than actually thinking seriously about whether they could retrieve the damage.
Sean Dyche can take a flicker of encouragement from the way his team started the evening. Unfortunately for them, they quickly discovered Chelsea are not a side to wilt the moment something goes wrong. Their response was a reminder to Burnley about the gulf between the sides they will face this year compared to last season in the Championship. It was a blur of speed and movement and, for Burnley, a lesson about what can happen when a team built for GBP5m bumps into one with a valuation of £190m. Burnley, where they have come from, are simply not accustomed to playing sides that move the ball this devastatingly.
Chelsea's equaliser came within four minutes when Ivanovic broke along the right touchline and his low centre took a slight flick off Michael Duff and went teasingly across the goalmouth before coming back off the post. From six yards, Costa had his first chance of the evening. He was on the ball in a flash, pulling back his left foot and scoring emphatically.
If that goal carried a touch of good fortune, the next goal left Chelsea's opponents dizzied by their speed of thought and movement. Eden Hazard's jinking run through the middle started the move. Ivanovic turned the ball into Fabregas and it was a wonderfully weighted pass he clipped into Schurrle's path. Schurrle had anticipated what was coming and did not break stride as he nonchalantly stroked his shot past Tom Heaton.
The night had quickly become an ordeal for Burnley and it might have been even more galling but for the referee, Michael Oliver, deciding Costa had dived when he intercepted Ben Mee's back-pass just in front of Heaton and had the opportunity to go around the goalkeeper. Costa looked appalled but it was only a passing irritation and within three minutes Fabregas had swung over a corner from the left for Ivanovic to volley in Chelsea's third.
For Burnley, the first lesson must be that they cannot continue defending this obligingly. The tone was set in the fourth minute when the right-back, Kieran Tripper, under-hit a pass to Heaton and the mistake almost ended with Schurrle scoring. Mee was culpable for losing Ivanovic for the third goal and Dyche, a rugged old centre-half in his day, must have been startled by the frequency of their lapses.
There are walls at Turf Moor lined with the match reports from that night here in 2009 when Blake lashed the ball into the roof of the United net. “Our Turf,” was the message spelt out in the mosaic of claret and blue in the Jimmy McIlroy Stand and Arfield’s 14th-minute strike fleetingly raised the possibility of a wonderful night ahead for the team Dyche had described as “the biggest underdogs in the history of the league”. Arfield, a 25-year-old Scot signed from Huddersfield Town, had taken the goal brilliantly, shooting through a crowded penalty area and past the static Thibaut Courtois.
After that, however, Burnley did not really test Courtois, on the night he relegated Petr Cech to a place on the Chelsea bench, until early in the second half when he turned away another Arfield effort. At least the home side no longer looked in need of smelling salts in this period but there was still a clear imbalance of talent.
Didier Drogba came on as a second-half substitute and showed a glimpse of his old gifts, taking down Courtois's long kick on his knee and volleying a shot just wide with his next touch. Yet Chelsea were comfortable and, at times, they had looked majestic.
Guardian Service
BURNLEY: Heaton, Trippier, Duff, Shackell, Mee, Arfield, Marney, Jones, Taylor (Kightly 70), Ings (Sordell 82), Jutkiewicz (Barnes 70). Subs Not Used: Wallace, Gilks, Long, Dummigan. Booked: Sordell.
CHELSEA: Courtois, Ivanovic, Cahill, Terry, Azpilicueta, Fabregas, Matic, Schurrle (Willian 78), Oscar (Mikel 82), Hazard (Drogba 84), Costa. Subs Not Used: Cech, Luis, Zouma, Torres. Booked: Costa.
Referee: Michael Oliver (Northumberland).
