Chelsea 0-1 Porto (2-1): Blues Through to the Semis

Chelsea lost on the night but progress to the semi-finals for the first time since 2014. Chelsea controlled much of the game with Porto, not being a threat to the Blues’ 2-0 aggregate lead.

After a comfortable win against their London rivals, Crystal Palace on the weekend, Chelsea manager Thomas Tuchel opted to keep the same front three of Mason Mount, Kai Havertz and Christian Pulisic with Timo Werner left on the bench. While Porto‘s top scorer in the Champions League, Sérgio Oliveira, was back in the starting XI after missing the first leg due to suspension.

Mason Mount almost gave Chelsea the decisive lead in the 7^th minute, but his shot was deflected by a Porto player which had left the goalkeeper helpless if it had gone in. However, a couple of minutes later, Edouard Mendy almost gifted Porto a way back into the tie when a simple back pass led to the keeper passing it to a Porto player. Luckily it was blocked by Jorginho.

Porto came close to halving the deficit after a long ball over Ben Chilwell led to Jesús Manuel Corona to blast the ball over the bar in the 32^nd minute.

The first half drew to an end with Porto playing better football in the first half than they did in the first leg.

Chelsea almost ended the tie when Mount received a beautiful ball from N’Golo Kanté but the shot was blocked in the 56^th minute.

Porto’s first chance to trouble the goalkeeper was in the 64^th minute when Chancel Mbemba generated the power to header the ball towards the goal but it was comfortably caught by Mendy.

The game was about to end in a goalless draw until the substitute, Mehdi Taremi, scored an incredible overhead kick in the dying moments of added time which resembled Cristiano Ronaldo’s goal against Juventus or Gareth Bale’s against Liverpool in the Champions League Finals.

However, this was not enough for Porto to drag the game into extra time, with Chelsea making sure the game ended without any heroic comeback.

Chelsea will play in the semi-finals for the first time since 2014 and will most likely be the underdogs, while Porto can go home with an impressive run including knocking out the Italian giants, Juventus.

Source of Photo: Champions League Twitter