Chelsea boast Premier League’s most devastating player in Cole Palmer

 

Chelsea are not a one-man team but they do boast the most devastatingly effective player in the Premier League in Cole Palmer.

This was another sumptuous, match-winning display from the England international, who created Chelsea’s first goal and scored their second. He won’t win the Ballon d’Or when it is announced on Monday, but the fact he was shortlisted for it says everything about how he is performing.

He is one of those rare breeds. A player who defines games even when you think he is having a quiet one. Teams simply cannot find a way to stop him, and without him Chelsea would have dropped points at home to Newcastle.

“The best thing from Cole is he never changes,” said Enzo Maresca, who laughed when he was told his young superstar admitted he did not know who club legend Gianfranco Zola was in his post-match interview.

“It does not surprise me that he does not know who Gianfranco is, that is Cole. But the reason people come to the stadium is to see players like him, that is what is important,” Maresca added.

“He is the way he is. He works so hard to have an impact on games. It does not happen by accident, he is always delivering something more.”

Palmer’s role in the first goal was sublime. It was ridiculously good. Picking the ball up on the edge of his own area, with three players trying to close him down – his speed of thought was just as impressive as the execution of the skill: a reverse pass on the turn that found the perfect line inside Newcastle’s right-back Tino Livramento, who was removed from the conversation in the blink of an eye.

The direction of the pass was perfect, but so too was the pace as it found the run of Pedro Neto. Newcastle’s lack of speed at centre-back was something Chelsea had clearly identified as a weakness and this was an impeccable implementation of the game plan by Palmer.

Neto was away, hurdling a desperate last-ditch tackle from the lumbering Fabian Schar, before squaring for the unmarked Nicolas Jackson to steer past goalkeeper Nick Pope. Jackson had started his run a few yards behind Schar’s centre-back colleague, Dan Burn, but sprinted past and away from him with ease.

“If you give Cole that sort of space he is going to kill you,” said Newcastle manager Eddie Howe. “We did not play him very well in those opening moments.”

The goal was a fitting reward for Chelsea’s early dominance. Palmer had only been denied an opening goal by a VAR intervention for offside, mistiming his run by a fraction before rolling a shot into the net via the inside of the post. It was a world-class finish even if the goal did not stand.

Chelsea, though, did not finish off Newcastle and allowed the visitors back into the game. Howe’s side are stuck in something of a rut at the moment, but this was a wonderful team goal.

Huge credit must go to Livramento, who set the Chelsea team into retreat with a driving run off his flank and into the middle. The ball was skillfully worked out to Harvey Barnes and Lewis Hall down the left, the latter’s cross bundled home by Alexander Isak. It was the Sweden international’s second goal of the season but that was as good as his afternoon would get.

The visitors left London knowing they did most of the damage to themselves. As for Isak, he travelled back to the North East knowing he had let down his team badly.

Isak has been brilliant for Newcastle in his two years on Tyneside and used to have the same sort of match-altering impact as Palmer has for Chelsea. But he has looked badly out of sorts since August. Howe can only hope this was the nadir. 

It was Isak who gave the ball away for Palmer to restore Chelsea’s lead early in the second half. Isak has been losing the ball like this far too regularly and this time his lapse gifted possession to the most dangerous player in the Chelsea team inside the Newcastle half.

Palmer said thank you, galloped goalwards and then lashed a ferocious low shot past Pope at his near post. It was the 22-year-old’s 20th goal in his past 24 appearances for the west Londoners. Isak held his hand up and apologised for the mistake.

Worse, though, was to follow. Isak missed a succession of chances in the home defeat to Brighton the previous weekend but this was criminal on his part.

Having put Wesley Fofana under pressure, Isak picked his pocket, took the ball around Robert Sanchez and only had to find a way past last defender Levi Colwill on the line. Isak did not lift his head up once. If he had, he would have seen Joelinton arriving in yards of space at the far post for a tap-in.

The Sweden international could have picked out Sean Longstaff or Joe Willock in the area too, but instead tried to dribble the ball past Colwill and ended up running into Moises Caicedo who cleared the ball into touch off the striker without getting a shot away. The angry shouts from the away end spoke volumes.

Isak had turned what should have been a goal into a goal-kick. He had cost Newcastle a deserved point, gifting Chelsea their second goal and then failing to punish them at the other end.

Part of the issue is there is no competition for Isak’s place from Callum Wilson, who remains injured and will not feature before the next international break. Wilson will turn 33 this season and has been fit enough to start only two games in 2024.

But Newcastle need so much more from their club-record signing. It is a problem that Howe needs to fix.

“When you slow everything down it always looks worse than it is,” said a diplomatic Howe after the game. “He didn’t see Jo there for a tap-in but everything is happening very fast and he needs to make a split-second decision.

“Alexander is getting the chances in the last two games that his all-round play deserves. Overall I’m pleased with the performance but there were mistakes at both ends of the pitch that have cost us the game.”