Dynamo Kiev vs Chelsea match report: Blues produce improved performance but can't find cutting edge

Dynamo Kiev 0 Chelsea 0

(Reuters)

Under normal circumstances, a team like Chelsea might look at a point like this, and a game like this, as something to forget about quickly and move on from, with precious little time devoted to it on the end of season DVD. This Chelsea though, the Chelsea of one of the most disastrous Premier League title defences ever launched, can certainly not turn their nose up at a clean sheet and a point.

This was not a classic match and nor was it a classic performance, but Chelsea found something here in the cold of Kyiv that has evaded them for much of the season: stability. Chelsea defended in numbers but they defended well, which is more than they have been able to say too often recently. They did not play brilliant football but nor did they promise to. When Mourinho spelled out before the game the qualities he was hoping for, he sounded like just what he is, the manager of a struggling team.

Despite a late flurry, Dynamo Kyiv did very little to impress, with or without the ball, but that is not the point. Chelsea have almost found ways of beating themselves this season, but in the Olympic Stadium they hung together, played together, and followed Mourinho’s instructions as far as their limited confidence and form would carry them. Again, that is a low bar for the champions of England to be clearing, but it is a bar that has recently been beyond them.

There were very few moments of quality on the pitch – Eden Hazard hit the post on the break, Willian hit the bar with a free-kick – but nor were there any moments of disaster or despair. After everything that has happened, this display – like the 2-0 defeat of Aston Villa – could represent if not progress then at least a bottoming-out, or clinging onto the last few rungs of a ladder that the team had been sliding down all season.

It was clear enough in advance what sort of game Mourinho was planning. The priorities, he said, were the basic Mourinho attributes which had been lost recently: “Tactical awareness, tactical discipline, spirit, effort, concentration.” So Ramires played in central midfield, Kurt Zouma went out to right-back and Chelsea dug in. That is what they tried to do in Porto, three weeks ago, of course, but this time it worked.

Mourinho hoped that if Chelsea just defended well enough – which they did – that they would take a chance on the break – which they did not. Hazard came back into the team, after being dropped on Saturday, and he had their best chance from open play, after just nine minutes. Keen to prove that he is still the best player on this team, Hazard found himself space and clipped a shot against the far post.

The rest of the first half was scrappy at best. Chelsea might have had a penalty for a foul on Cesc Fabregas, Diego Costa failed to convert a Willian free-kick, and Nemanja Matic was so surprised to find himself through on goal that he stabbed his chance wide.

The second half was little different. Willian hit the bar with a free-kick from 25 yards out, while Fabregas should have done better when Hazard put him through on the break.

Only after then did Dynamo finally start to threaten, with Andriy Yarmolenko growing into the game as it went on. Begovic had to save from Derlis Gonzalez and substitute Junior Moraes from close range, but the pressure was never too much, and in the final minutes Dynamo were simply throwing the ball into the box. Chelsea hung on to their point, and while that is nothing much to write home about, it is certainly better than not hanging on.