Twitter explodes as Chelsea and Manchester United share the spoils at Stamford Bridge

Chelsea's Jorginho redeemed himself against Manchester United after being at fault for the conceded goal.
Chelsea's Jorginho redeemed himself against Manchester United after being at fault for the conceded goal.

Struggling Manchester United have managed to hold league leaders Chelsea to an unlikely 1-1 draw at Stamford Bridge.

Michael Carrick, in his first Premier League game in charge of the club, decided to start with Cristiano Ronaldo on the bench. Jadon Sancho and Marcus Rashford started up top with Bruno Fernandes behind them in a 4-3-2-1 formation. Nemanja Matic started alongside Scott McTominay and Fred in midfield. Meanwhile, club captain Harry Maguire was suspended for the match after his red card against Watford last week.

Alex Telles continued his recent run of starts with Victor Lindelof and Eric Bailly starting in defense. Chelsea had a few players missing as expected. Apart from missing N'Golo Kante, Romelu Lukaku, Christian Pulisic, Kai Havertz and Mason Mount were all on the bench.

Chelsea started with Timo Werner up-top with Callum Hudson-Odoi and Hakim Ziyech behind him. Marcus Alonso took the left wing-back position in place of the injured Ben Chilwell. Meanwhile Jorginho and Ruben Loftus-Cheek were the holding midfielders.

The game started as expected, with Manchester United sitting deep and hardly creating a chance in the first half. Chelsea had most of the ball but struggled with their final pass. After a goal-less first half, the game sprung to life in the second as Jadon Sancho registered his first Premier League goal.


Manchester United put in a combative second half performance as Chelsea go behind after Jorginho error

European Footballer of the year Jorginho made a torrid 50th minute mistake. During a Chelsea corner, the Italian was the last man for Chelsea. A clearance from the United defense made its way to Jorginho. His failure to control the ball resulted in a 2 vs 1 with Eduardo Mendy against Sancho and Marcus Rashford. Sancho decided to score himself to slot in his second goal in two games.

However, a scuffle in Manchester Unitd’s box following a corner resulted in Aaron Wan Bissaka tripping Thiago Silva from behind. Jorginho promptly redeemed himself. He sent David De Gea the wrong way and slotted the resulting penalty neatly into the bottom left corner.

Manchester United were lucky not to concede in the first half as they were guilty of playing a bit too narrow. It was obviously an attempt to be as compact as they could be.

The second half started in much better fashion although Chelsea still dominated the ball. United again had to defend for most of the time although they had few chances to hit Chelsea on the counter. Manchester United will be happy with their defensive performance although they were extremely poor with their passing and decisions. A number of United players were guilty of giving the ball away cheaply multiple times.

The trio of Fred, Matic and McTominay were not a lot of value on the ball but put in extremely busy performances, particularly Fred. Romelu Lukaku was brought in for the final 1o minutes but did not get a clear cut chance.

Just like the first goal, Chelsea were guilty of giving away the ball cheaply a second time in the 87th minute. Mendy made a horrific clearance that went straight to Fred. The Brazilian decided to try and lob Mendy from outside the box instead of passing it to the red shirts inside. Mendy easily gathered the ball.

Manchester United will be happy with the draw. But they were only able to get it due to an uncharacteristically poor attacking display from Chelsea. The Blues failed to make the most of the situations they got into.

As expected, fans were extremely vocal about the match. They took to Twitter to showcase their reactions. Here are some of the best ones:

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Edited by Aditya Singh
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