Asia Trophy: Chelsea 2-0 Aston Villa - Match Reports, Goal Videos, Manager's Reaction
Matt The Blue |
The match reports
The Guardian, Dominic Fifield: “Fernando Torres’s scriptwriter has finally earned his money. The Spaniard’s ineffective form in pre-season was jettisoned in timely fashion here as Chelsea bade farewell to the far east with victory, the Barclays Asia Trophy and a striker looking more like his old self. The goal guided in with the Spaniard’s first touch just before the hour-mark was instinctively pilfered and hardly celebrated. It was also hugely welcome.”
Official Chelsea FC Website: “Chelsea made it six wins from six in pre-season as we lifted the Barclays Asia Trophy following a convincing win against Aston Villa in Hong Kong. It sees John Terry claim a trophy he first lifted eight years ago in Kuala Lumpur, and is the perfect start to the campaign for new manager Andre Villas-Boas, who was able to give a large chunk of his squad valuable match minutes once more.”
The goals2’ McEachran 1-0 59’ Torres 2-0
“I have been optimistic throughout [the Asian tour]. It’s been a very intensive tour in all senses, and I think today I must congratulate the players for the superhuman effort they put on the pitch and the performance.
“It has been training non-stop, trips non-stop, commercial activities non-stop and for the players to be able to show this mental and physical freshness and to put on the things we trained is something that leaves me very confident and optimistic. It has the value it has because the most important thing in the end is to win when we start the Premiership but it’s great to feel the group and the team together as we showed today.
“Commitment-wise, motivationally, and the professionalism of the players has been something I haven’t seen before.
“It’s not easy to come away from your home and in these difficult conditions we find to put on a tremendous effort in training, always finding motivation and this is a positive sign for us. Generally speaking we are happy with the tour we have had.
“It was good [today]. We managed to find the correct space, it was a good pass from Bosingwa to Nico and then following from that, we really found some good spaces. It’s important for us to find these spaces and have these opportunities.
“It’s a good sign, of course Aston Villa is as tired as we are, but in the end it was good. To create opportunities is one of our main objectives, a lot more attacking football and possession and we were able to do it today. Even so, coping with Aston Villa’s aggressiveness in their game, always testing us in behind and we were able to manage it quite well in the first half and better in the second half.”