Joao Felix sends message to Enzo Maresca ahead of Arsenal clash as Chelsea run riot

Evening Standard

·7. November 2024

Joao Felix sends message to Enzo Maresca ahead of Arsenal clash as Chelsea run riot

Felix could play a leading role for Chelsea again the Gunners with Cole Palmer recovering from a knock

Little to learn but plenty to enjoy on the night for Enzo Maresca.

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It was always a formality that Chelsea would rack up a glut of goals against minnows FC Noah. Fourth in the Armenian Premier League and the first side ever to come through all four qualifying rounds of the Europa Conference League, they were subjected to a hammering by the Blues.

Maresca’s ‘B team’ players fulfilled the task in front of them and then some, six goals up at the interval and 8-0 winners by the end.

Particularly lively were Joao Felix and Christopher Nkunku, the former notching a first-half brace and the latter scoring twice in the second.

Felix was at the heart of nearly every Chelsea move of note, and Maresca will surely now give serious consideration to starting the Portuguese in the No10 role against Arsenal on Sunday if Cole Palmer is not passed fit after his knock.

Felix slotted past goalkeeper Ognjen Čancarevic to put the Blues into a commanding 4-0 lead, before making it six with a deflected effort shortly after.

Palmer was watching on at Stamford Bridge wrapped up in a thick beige puffer jacket and will have been impressed as Chelsea’s second string kept up their intensity for the full 94 minutes against their visitors from the west of Armenia.

Cole Palmer had a watching brief alongside Jadon Sancho

Chelsea FC via Getty Images

Though the defending from Noah was often more than suspect, it boded well for the Blues that they were so aerially dominant from set pieces, with Tosin Adarabioyo and Axel Disasi both cashing in with headed goals before the interval.

Moments of individual brilliance were restricted to one, and Maresca will have been delighted that it fell to Mykhailo Mudryk. The Ukrainian cut in from his left wing position, onto his right foot, and bent a pearler into the top corner. Celebration? No need. Mudryk simply nodded in approval of his own thunderous strike.

Marc Guiu also struck before the interval, and the Spaniard worked his socks off.

There was a deserved first senior start for 18-year-old academy product Tyrique George, who has impressed off the bench against Servette, Gent, Panathinaikos and in the Carabao Cup against Barrow.

The right winger has a goal and four assists in seven games for Chelsea Under-21s in the Premier League 2 this season and ought to have had an assist in the first six minutes of his full debut, but his perfectly-weighted cross was fluffed on the line by the otherwise on-song Felix.

And after Nkunku scored the Blues’ only goals of the second half, Maresca was able to hand a first senior appearance to George’s academy team-mate, Samuel Rak-Sakyi. The 19-year-old made one smart darting run with the ball in his 11-minute cameo.

The only disappointed faces will have been those who didn’t get onto the pitch for this goal-fest.