Chelsea Win Continues Unbeaten 25-Year Home Premier League Record on Monday Nights
Chelsea triumphed 2-0 against West Ham on Monday night at Stamford Bridge, taking themselves up to third in the Premier League in the process.
This was a big win for the Blues, thanks primarily to a transcendent individual performance from Eden Hazard. But, given the last minute nature of Hazard's second goal, it was not always as comfortable as the stereotypically comfortable scoreline suggests.
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Yet it was always destined to happen. Because, when it comes to home games at the Bridge, Chelsea literally never lose. Well, not since 1994, anyway. Seriously, this is statistically factual.
Courtesy of Opta: "Chelsea haven’t lost a home Premier League game on a Monday since December 1994 (2-3 vs Man Utd), winning 12 and drawing three since."
DECEMBER. 1994. Spoiler alert, that's before I was born. And it's well before Callum Hudson-Odoi, Ruben Loftus-Cheek, Andreas Christensen, Ethan Ampadu and Rob Green were. Well, maybe not the last one, but he was only 14. Imagine! Rob Green at 14. Crikey.
As everyone is by now aware of, Chelsea are on the precipice of a (potentially - the Jury's still out, to be honest) damaging two-window transfer ban. If the two remaining appeals at this process fail to succeed, this will - obviously - prevent the club from signing anyone this summer, or next January.
It would prevent the club from replacing the wantaway/wantastay forward that so bamboozled the Hammers defence on Monday night, should he actually up and leave to Real Madrid. It would prevent them from landing a striker under the age of 31 - apart from Tammy Abraham and Michy Batshuayi. So actually, it won't.
But, after all, it is a punishing measure designed to prevent them from doing a host of things that they would otherwise do. So the key question becomes: Do Monday night TV packages come under this transfer embargo? Because that's the only summer signing worth fighting for, at this point.
Food for thought.
