Chelsea Settle for a Draw in Valencia After a Few Unfortunate Errors.

Well, I'm absolutely gutted. That game was ours to win, and a very unfortunate handball in the box by Saloman Kalou in the 87th minute allowed Roberto Soldado to convert his penalty and tie the game 1-1, after Lampard's goal in the 56th.

Frank Lampard celebrates his excellent one-timer goal in the 56th minute.

While Valencia did win the possession battle, Chelsea seemed quite dominant for the majority of the game and created many excellent chances. If not for the consistently excellent goalkeeping by Valencia's Diego Alvez, the score-line would have looked quite different. 

Here was the Chelsea lineup for yesterday's match:

        Malouda ----------------- Torres (Anelka) ----------------- Mata

    Lampard (Kalou) ----------------- Mikel ----------------- Ramires (Meireles)

           Cole ----------------- Terry ----------------- Luiz ----------------- Bosingwa

                                                Cech

Bench: Turnbull, Ivanovic, Romeu, Drogba.

NOTABLE CHELSEA PLAYERS:

- Frank Lampard: Showed that he isn't ready to be left out of the Chelsea starting 11, taking an excellent one-timed shot off of Florent Malouda's great pass across the box, and put Chelsea ahead in the 56th minute. Came forward well on the Chelsea attacks and assisted a Ramires shot that was very close to a goal. 

- Saloman Kalou: Very unfortunate outing whose handball in the Chelsea box (after only 3 minutes of play) cost Chelsea the full three points. 

- Juan Mata: Played well, as expected, and was given a standing ovation by the crowd in Valencia as a welcome back to his old stadium, and a thank-you for his many years of service for the club. I thought that was very nice of the home crowd.

MATCH OVERVIEW:

Chelsea started the first half with many blocked chances by Diego Alves, the Valencia keeper, and dominated the game for the early part of the first half, until Valencia began to calm themselves down and take possession. All quiet at the end of the first half, but when the second half began, Chelsea came out very strong. A flurry of chances (all saved by Alvez) stopped the score-line from favouring Chelsea, and kept it at nil-nil, until the 56th minute, when Chelsea finally broke through. Malouda dribbled the ball up the right side, and then sent an excellent pass across the box to Frank Lampard, who took a brilliant one-timed shot and put Chelsea ahead 1-0. Chelsea made three substitutions in the 66th (Ramires off, Raul Meireles on), 72nd (Torres off, Anelka on), and the 83rd (Lampard off, Kalou on), all interspersed with good efforts from both sides. However, in the 86th minute, Sofiane Feghouli took a corner for Valencia, and the ball caught the arm of a jumping Saloman Kalou, who was given a yellow card. Valencia also received a penalty shot, and Roberto Soldado made no mistake with the shot, sending Petr Cech diving the wrong way to make the score-line level. In the 90th, Nicolas Anelka came very close to scoring for the visitors, but Diego Alvez once again made an excellent save to rob Chelsea of three points. Malouda also received a yellow card in the 90th, and Juan Mata and Ashley COle both received post-game yellow cards for arguing with the referee. The final score was 1-1. 

MATCH STATISTICS:

                                               Valencia                    Chelsea

Ball Possession (%)                   54                               46

Shots (on target)                      14(7)                          10(9)

Corners                                      6                                 5

Crosses                                     28                               12

Fouls Committed                       9                                 9

Yellow Cards                             2                                 4

Red Cards                                  0                                 0

Offsides                                     3                                 2

OTHER FIXTURES:

Group E (Chelsea's Group):

Bayer Leverkusen 2-0 Genk

Group F:

Marseille 3-0 Borussia Dortmund

Arsenal 2-1 Olympiacos

Group G:

Shaktar Donetsk 1-1 APOEL

Zenit St. Petersburg 3-1 Porto

Group H:

BATE 0-5 Barcelona

AC Milan 2-0 Viktoria Pizen

Full match highlights