Dinamo Zagreb 1-0 Chelsea (Orsic ’13)
Wesley Fofana joined Chelsea for nights like this – except not quite like this. The Champions League, which has underpinned so much of Thomas Tuchel’s good work and helped attract their £70m new centre-back, had promised a safe haven in Zagreb and instead produced the first major upset of the 2022-23 competition courtesy of Mislav Orsic’s early goal.
With £171m worth of new signings in the starting XI at the Stadion Maksimir, Tuchel could reasonably have expected an indicator of the dominance English clubs are expected to enjoy in Europe this season. The transfer window ended with Premier League sides having blown the rest of the continent out of the water.
Yet Chelsea had been warned. Orsic, the man whose burst of pace and composure made a mockery of Todd Boehly’s defensive summer spree, has previous with visitors from the capital. He is the man behind some of the Croatian’s most famous nights, hitting a hat-trick past Tottenham in 2021 to overturn a two-goal first-leg deficit and knock Jose Mourinho’s side out of the Europa League.
This time, Kalidou Koulibaly was unable to make contact as he sought to breach the gap between Mateo Kovacic and Mason Mount in midfield, before Orsic found himself in a one-on-one race with Fofana. On just his second appearance for his new club, the centre-back could not keep up and Orsic finished with the outside of his boot around Kepa Arrizabalaga, who was starting in place of the dropped Edouard Mendy.
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A goal which had initially looked against the run of play turned the game as Chelsea struggled to break down the hosts’ back line. Debutant Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, wearing a mask to protect his broken jaw, had been frustrated in his early breakthroughs into the final third, his run down the right ending in a tame shot straight at Dominik Livakovic.
Aubameyang thought he had equalised with a tap-in – ruled out for offside – but in fact it was Zagreb who came closest to a second goal, Kepa at full stretch to tip Stefan Ristovski’s long-range strike onto the woodwork.
Kai Havertz appealed in vain for a penalty having been bundled over by Josip Sutalo, and came close to a headed chance, intercepted by the omnipresent Robert Ljubicic. Ristovski’s late double save then denied first Cesar Azpilicueta and substitute Hakim Ziyech, a combination of instinct and fortitude to keep Zagreb alive. But these are margins which Chelsea cannot afford to fall back on.
After losing their last two away games in the Premier League and requiring a late show at home to get past West Ham, what will alarm Tuchel most is that his side are yet to deliver a convincing 90 minutes this season – and this was the latest manifestation of a back three that is not coordinated and an attack that is not clicking.
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- Kepa 7
- Azpilicueta 5
- Fofana 4
- Koulibaly 5
- James 6.5
- Mount 5
- Kovacic 6
- Chilwell 5
- Havertz 6
- Aubameyang 5
- Sterling 6
Substitutes:
- Ziyech 5
- Jorginho 5
- Broja 6
- Cucurella 6
- Pulisic 4
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