Chelsea 0 Rovers 0

[Alan75]

Chelsea: Cech, Belletti, Alex, Terry, Ashley Cole (Ben-Haim 88), Wright-Phillips (Malouda 57), Sidwell (Obi 57), Essien, Joe Cole, Kalou, Shevchenko.

Subs Not Used: Cudicini, Ferreira.

Booked: Joe Cole, Belletti.

Rovers: Friedel, Emerton, Samba (Ooijer 90), Nelsen, Warnock, Bentley, Savage, Dunn (Mokoena 81), Pedersen, McCarthy (Roberts 68), Santa Cruz.

Subs Not Used: Brown, Derbyshire.

Booked: Warnock, Savage.

Att: 41,062

Ref: Howard Webb

League Position. 7th

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Mark Hughes Post Match Comments.

"I hope it's just a knock and Christopher will be groggy just for a couple of days.

"We know we're a good side at this level.

"We've come here and set out our stall and made sure we didn't go under. Maybe we would have a couple of seasons ago."

Rovers extended their unbeaten run with a 0-0 draw against Chelsea at Stamford Bridge this afternoon.

Although not their best performance of the season, Rovers grinded out a result, with Brad Friedel coming to their rescue on more that one occation; that included a fine save from Essien and a vital late block from Shevchenko.

Chelsea did get the ball into the back of the net, only for referee Howard Webb to rule it off side. Much to Mourinio's annoyance, whereby he took out his frustration on a tv monitor in the dug out.

During the final stages when Friedel saved from Shevchenko, Chris Samba was accidentally kicked in the head by Shevchenko, when the big centre half stooped to block a shot.

Although Samba was stretchered off the pitch unconscious, he eventually came round and should travel home with the rest of the team.

Match Comment by RevidgeBlue

We were lucky with the offside goal, my initial reaction was it was clearly offside, but someone in the Pub correctly pointed out that the ball went marginally backwards on the cross and the Chelsea player (despite being the wrong side of the defence) was behind the ball therefore it was onside.

I groaned when I heard the referee was Howard Webb, but I felt after that after that West Ham debacle, he actually bent over backwards to give us most of the 50-50-s today. Previously unheard of against a top 4 side.

As for our performance, I thought we were superb fo the first 20 minutes and fairly ropey for the last 70 - we have to hope Samba's injury isn't long term, he's by far our best player on form and the rock around which our early season start has been built.

Disappointed with the front two today, McCarthy once again was a complete waste of space, he was too busy hugging and snogging Mourinho before kick off and Santa Cruz didn't work anything like as hard as he has done in previous games this season.

Nevertheless we haven't played that well today and still come away from the Bridge with a point. That says a lot for our "stickability" I said last week after the City game we were looking very hard to beat and hopefully that will continue to be the case, even when we're not on top form.