THINGS WE LEARNED as Chelsea beat Brighton 4-3
Chelsea emerged victorious by the odd goal in seven as they and Brighton played out a thriller in the opening match of the Premier League Summer Series.
Mail Sport's CRAIG HOPE was at the Lincoln Financial Field in Philadelphia to bring you his five talking points…
To say that Mauricio Pochettino has work to do at Chelsea is like claiming Santa Claus will be busy on Christmas Eve. Four of his starters had never played competitively for the club, while the bench contained several names who would hardly be known to anyone outside of West London.
It was Brighton who looked the better of the sides in the first half, before a raft of second-half substitutions and the dismissal of Seagulls defender Jan Paul van Hecke at 1-1. He was shown a second yellow card for a barge on Cesare Casadei that almost left the young Italian in the first row of the main stand.
And despite Chelsea’s victory - they were excellent going forward against 10 men at times - this game still underlined the size of the task Pochettino has inherited. You only had to look at the team-sheet to learn that much. They remain terribly light in midfield especially, where only Conor Gallagher was a senior starter - and there had been talk of him leaving the club this summer. Not now. In fairness, Gallagher did well and his energy, tidy distribution and goal were a huge positive for Pochettino. He needs plenty more of those before Chelsea have any chance of reclaiming their place in the top six of the Premier League, never mind the top four.
One of those positives already looks like being £31million striker Nicolas Jackson, who arrived from Villarreal this summer. He has four assists over two friendlies and got his first goal for the Blues here.
You knew he was never
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