Blues up to 2nd with Palace win; Spurs falter once more

Chelsea moved up a point ahead of Manchester City and inched closer to within five of Premier League leaders Liverpool with a 2-0 win over Crystal Palace on Saturday. Meanwhile, Tottenham’s woes continued with a draw at home to Sheffield United.

Chelsea’s was a patient performance that broke down a defensively dogged Crystal Palace at Stamford Bridge. Tammy Abraham moved level with Leicester’s Jamie Vardy as the top scorer in the Premier League with 10 goals as the England striker pounced on a deft flick through by Willian seven minutes into the second half.

Christian Pulisic then secured all three points when the American headed home his fifth goal in his last three Premier League games.

“We won the game relatively comfortably,” said Chelsea boss Frank Lampard.

“A nice, solid win with a clean sheet.”

Tottenham slip to 12th and were lucky to even escape with a 1-1 draw as Sheffield United impressed once more to move up to fifth.

John Lundstram struck the post for the visitors with the best effort of the first half, but a rare defensive error from the Blades set up Son Heung-min to open the scoring with his eighth goal of the season just before the hour mark.

David McGoldrick thought he had levelled almost immediately, but after a three-minute delay the goal was ruled out for Lundstram being millimetres offside in the build-up.

To their credit, Chris Wilder’s men were not downhearted and survived another VAR review when George Baldock’s cross from the right evaded everyone and found the bottom corner.

West Ham’s woes continued as Manuel Pellegrini’s men were beaten 3-0 at Burnley to stretch their winless streak to seven games.

Ashley Barnes opened the scoring after 11 minutes as Burnley never looked back.

Chris Wood doubled the hosts’ advantage after earlier having a goal ruled out by VAR for offside and a miserable day for the visitors at Turf Moor was summed up when goalkeeper Roberto punched a corner into his own net.

Everton moved six points clear of the relegation zone thanks to a 2-1 win at Southampton to ease the pressure on Marco Silva. Tom Davies gave the Toffees the perfect start at St Mary’s before Danny Ings equalised early in the second half. But Richarlison struck the winner 15 minutes from time to secure Everton’s first away league win since March.

Newcastle are now seven points clear of the drop zone as they came from behind to beat Bournemouth 2-1 at St James’ Park thanks to goals from DeAndre Yedlin and Ciaran Clark.

On Friday, Watford got off the mark with their first win of the Premier League season to climb off the foot of the table at Norwich’s expense with a 2-0 victory at Carrow Road.

The Hornets, finishing the game with 10 men, made a dream start as Gerard Deulofeu slotted the ball past Canaries goalkeeper Tim Krul inside the second minute. Andre Gray doubled his side’s lead seven minutes into the second half with an acrobatic backheeled flick.

Watford looked to be easing towards all three points but Christian Kabasele’s dismissal, after a second yellow card, left his side a man down for the last 25 minutes. Norwich’s defending was questionable at times, and the defence struggled to contain Watford on the counter-attack as a winless run stretching back to September’s shock success over Manchester City continued. With less than a minute and a half on the clock, Deulofeu weaved through the Norwich defenders inside the box before giving his side the lead with a curled effort.

Watford started the second half in similar fashion to the first and were rewarded when Deulofeu’s cross went to Gray, who twisted to backheel the ball past Krul to double his side’s lead.

Facing an uphill task, Norwich came close through Jamal Lewis, whose curled effort forced Foster to deflect the ball behind. After picking up a booking in the first half, Kabasele was shown a red card by referee Andre Marriner in the 65th minute for a careless foul on Josip Drmic, just as Norwich looked to be gaining some momentum in the match.

Kenny McLean came close to pulling one back with a long-range powerful drive which was tipped over by Foster - but the Canaries struggled to make the numerical advantage count.

Agence France-Presse



English Premier League results on Saturday:

Chelsea 2 (Abraham 52, Pulisic 79) Crystal Palace 0; Southampton 1 (Ings 50) Everton 2 (Davies 4, Richarlison 75); Tottenham 1 (Son 58) Sheffield United 1 (Baldock 78); Burnley 3 (Barnes 14, Wood 44, Jimenez 54-og) West Ham 0; Newcastle 2 (Yedlin 42, Clark 52) Bournemouth 1 (H. Wilson 14)

On Friday: Norwich 0 Watford 2 (Deulofeu 2, Gray 52)