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Hazard Sends Chelsea To Europa League Final Ahead Of Probable Exit by ekeleboy(m): 8:22am On May 10, 2019 |
LONDON -- Eden Hazard was shot, knackered,
spent. The Europa League is not his stage, not
really; everybody knows that and it is one reason
why, as Chelsea plugged along through their
previous 15 outings in the competition, he had
only been wheeled out for 228 minutes in total.
Here he had dragged himself through an entire
two hours, those whirring legs slowing up to
eventually resemble paddles sludging their way
through mud. The juice had run out; the ideas
had really too. Eintracht Frankfurt had brought
this tie to a knife edge and, with it, had put
Hazard's grand finale on the line.
Stamford Bridge is Hazard's stage. It has been
for seven years now, no matter what the
competition. Hazard's fire has raged during that
time, ever so occasionally dying down to merely
a flicker. He has slalomed his way to titles;
bewitched his way to individual awards; carried
dying teams on his shoulders; jinked into the
club's pantheon of greats to such an extent that
the drawn-out, opaque departure process he has
undergone this season has drawn barely a
murmur of disapproval from the stands.
But Hazard had never faced a situation like this.
He had watched Cesar Azpilicueta miss in the
shootout and give Eintracht one foot on the
final. He had then seen Kepa Arrizabalaga, wise
to Martin Hinteregger's attempt to drill the ball
down the middle, stand firm and wedge it
between his legs. He knew his time was coming
when Goncalo Paciencia, his stuttering run-up
postage stamped with inevitability, let Kepa save
again. Now, he had his chance: one last shot for
one last final; one last shot in front of the crowd
that he adores and who have, with no need for
encouragement, reciprocated that in bundles;
one last moment of high drama to bookend the
lightning bolts of sheer magic.
- Player ratings: Kepa's shootout saves make
him Chelsea's UEL hero
Hazard did not miss. Nobody seriously thought
he would; that he would score was probably the
nearest thing to a certainty on a wild, snarling
night that swung this way and that. He sent
Kevin Trapp the wrong way, perhaps grateful for
the 10 minutes he had been given to clear his
mind since the end of extra time. It was a crisp,
lucid finish; they usually are, and as most of his
teammates flocked to mob Kepa, Hazard ran
slightly behind, eyes trained on the Shed End's
mass of part-relieved, part-delirious limbs.
"I always take my responsibility," Hazard said
afterward. His responsibility was to score,
whether or not this was his last kick of a ball at
Stamford Bridge; but if he is indeed to leave
Chelsea this summer, there is something else at
play too. He has helped them to hold their nerve
domestically -- to a sounder degree than their
rivals, in any case -- and quality for next season's
Champions League. If he can send himself off
with a second Europa League title, beating
Arsenal in Baku and adding to the trophy won in
2012-13, then perhaps he can leave in the
knowledge that a fractured club is finally
beginning to heal.
Because, make no mistake, Chelsea's home is a
complex, troubled place.
Five minutes before the end of normal time,
Maurizio Sarri replaced Ruben Loftus-Cheek --
the scorer of their first-half opener but a
diminishing influence as Eintracht clawed their
way back into the tie -- with the fresher legs of
Ross Barkley. Ordinarily, it should not have been
a controversial move, but the disdain for Sarri,
palpable since the winter, needed little excuse to
rear its head even on what was, whether they
liked it or not, Chelsea's biggest game of the
season. The boos rang out from all four sides; it
was far removed from the expectant, supportive
environment that might be expected when things
were going to the wire against excellent
opponents, but nothing about this season in west
London has fitted preconceived notions.
Everything feels on thin ice here. Sarri has
steered them to a respectable finish and might
well top that with a European trophy, but his
philosophy, his preference for method over
indignant, us-against-the-world belligerence,
simply does not seem to fit. When Eintracht's
brilliant young striker Luka Jovic equalised after
half-time, the tension was that of a crowd
waiting to turn.
"Over the 120 minutes, we were the better team
and had the better chances," the Eintracht
coach Adi Hutter claimed. He was probably
right: The substitute Sebastien Haller saw two
extra-time efforts cleared off the line; and from
beginning to end, it was only the visiting
supporters -- surely the loudest, most inventive
bunch heard at any top-level match in England
this year -- who seemed energised to offer
unconditional support.
They and their vibrant team, which faces a
breakup comparable to that of Champions
League heroes Ajax, deserved more. But Chelsea
themselves might lose a huge part of their
modern identity come August. The chances of
seeing anyone capable of such sustained
brilliance as Hazard -- whose name was greeted
with bellows of approval before kickoff as a flag
bearing his image was passed along the
Matthew Harding Stand -- gracing this turf in the
foreseeable future are remote.
At least they could wring out every last drop
here. It was Hazard who set up Loftus-Cheek's
goal before, by his exacting standards, failing to
match perspiration with end product. That was
before he settled the issue, threw his shirt to the
crowd and disappeared down the tunnel for what
was surely the final time.
"In my mind, I don't know yet," he said,
inscrutable as ever, when asked about his future.
"If it is my last game [against Arsenal], I will try
to do everything."
One last flourish could yet fix Chelsea and Sarri.
But after delivering so poetically here, you
wonder what more he could possibly do. |
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