Chelsea 6-3 Leeds United. Carabao Cup third round, Stamford Bridge, and for about an hour it wasn't even that — Leeds level, competing, giving as good as they got. Then Chelsea's bench turned it into a different game entirely, Morgan Rogers inspiring a six-goal second-half avalanche that nobody saw coming, least of all us.
That's the thing about Chelsea these days — you can hold your own against the eleven that started, then watch a bench worth more than most Premier League squads combined turn the whole game on its head. Financial fair play is apparently just a polite suggestion if you're willing to sign absolutely everyone on an eight-year contract.
Nights like that sting more than the table suggests they should. It's a cup tie, squad rotation, the kind of result that won't matter by October. Doesn't stop it feeling rubbish at full time.
We'd put a shirt on the shelves two days before this one, as it happens — "Through It All, Together," a heavyweight tee that was never meant to be about one specific result. It's about the promotions and the play-off heartbreak and the last-minute winners and the long coach trips, the whole unreasonable deal that comes with following this club. We didn't plan it for a night like Stamford Bridge. It just turned out to fit.
Brighton away drew 1-1 last weekend, this one's a defeat that won't touch the league table, and Newcastle's at Elland Road on Monday. Onwards, like always.
