Our 3️⃣ points after Chelsea and Man Utd play out eventful draw | OneFootball

Chelsea’s lead at the top of the Premier League was cut to one point after they drew with Manchester United on Sunday.

Here’s what we made of the action from Stamford Bridge.

Bold as brass

If this is to be Michael Carrick’s last match in charge of United, he’s done his CV no harm at all with two very decent results.

In truth, they weren’t brilliant against Villarreal or Chelsea but after hitting rock bottom at Watford last week, they just needed to start rebuilding their confidence, and that’s exactly what they’ve done

Carrick showed with his team selection for this game that he isn’t afraid to make big decisions as he dropped Cristiano Ronaldo to the bench and went with a three-man midfield.

It made United much harder to play through than they have been at times this season, with Nemanja Matić having a particularly excellent game against his old club.

But after taking a shock lead, Carrick perhaps showed a bit of inexperience by taking goalscorer Jadon Sancho off and putting Ronaldo on.

Taking Bruno Fernandes off might have made more sense but that change killed United’s momentum and let Chelsea back into the game.

Overall though, a draw at Stamford Bridge is not to be sniffed at.

Turning the air blue

Thomas Tuchel will be less happy with a point though, you’d imagine.

The Chelsea boss’s frustration came to the fore when he was booked in the dying minutes for angrily protesting a non-offside call against Ronaldo that was bizarre, in fairness.

But that’s the third time the Blues have dropped points at home this season and with Manchester City and Liverpool breathing down their necks, they will be starting to feel the pressure.

It’s a credit to the club’s academy that they started this match with four ex-youth-teamers but in an ideal world, some of them wouldn’t be starting the big games and Tuchel will be glad to have Mason Mount and Romelu Lukaku back from injury after they came off the bench in the second half.

The German will also be annoyed with Jorginho’s uncharacteristic error for United’s goal, and relieved that Edouard Mendy’s brainfart wasn’t as costly later in the game.

It’s not a bad result for the title-chasers, but it’s not a great one either.

Redemption song

With the Ballon d’Or winner to be announced on Monday, Jorginho picked a sub-optimal time to make a big mistake with the world watching.

But luckily for him, it wasn’t long before he was given the chance to redeem himself from the penalty spot and after his recent miss for Italy, it took character and composure for him to step up and score.

United fans might have been cursing Aaron Wan-Bissaka for his clumsy foul to give the penalty away, but it was also him who made a big block to stop Timo Werner making it 2-1 later in the game.

All’s well that ends well.