Southampton 0-6 Chelsea (Alonso 8′, Mount 16′, 54′, Werner 21′, 49′, Havertz 31)
Chelsea bounced back from a disappointing week to thrash Southampton 6-0 at St Mary’s with Mason Mount and Timo Werner both helping themselves to two goals.
Thomas Tuchel admitted to being driven to a chocolate binge after Chelsea’s disappointing 3-1 defeat against Real Madrid at Stamford Bridge in midweek, a result that followed a shock 4-1 loss at home against Brentford last weekend.
However, the Chelsea boss would have been far happier with his players’ performance on the south coast.
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Saints failed to heed those warnings, though, with Marcos Alonso firing an effort through Fraser Forster’s legs to open the scoring after being picked out by the sensational Mount.
Mount made it two eight minutes later with an accurate finish from the edge of the box and Werner got in on the act soon after, rounding Forster before passing into an empty net to make it 3-0 after only 21 minutes.
10 minutes later it was four, with Kai Havertz becoming Chelsea’s fourth different goalscorer of the afternoon. Initially, it looked as though the German had been afflicted with the same curse as Werner as his shot hit the post, but the rebound dropped perfectly back into his path to score a tap-in.
The visitors showed no let-up in the second half, with Werner adding his second of the game and third in the league this season five minutes after the restart, after Forster had denied N’Golo Kante. Mount scored his second and Chelsea’s sixth soon after from close range.
With the game well and truly up, Tuchel took the opportunity to give some of his key players a rest ahead of Tuesday’s Champions League quarter-final second leg at the Bernabeu. Havertz, Mount and Thiago Silva all made way during the second half.
At one stage, it looked as though Southampton were in real danger of succumbing to a third 9-0 defeat in as many seasons, but fortunately for Ralph Hasenhuttl’s side, Chelsea noticeably slowed down their tempo to conserve energy ahead of some big games to come.
Speaking after the loss to Real, Tuchel insisted that the tie was over. This display suggested that he might have written his team off prematurely.
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