Frank Lampard’s first Premier League match in charge of Chelsea turned into a nightmare yesterday as his side were hammered 4-0 at Manchester United.
Marcus Rashford opened the scoring with an 18th-minute penalty and Rashford, Anthony Martial and Daniel James secured a convincing victory for the home side.
“Four mistakes for the goals, we have to be self-critical for that,” Lampard said.
“We controlled the first half hour but made some poor decisions. We should be in the lead at the break. It is easier for them to play at 2-0, 3-0. I can’t look at it and be happy. But if you look at the game, it is not a 4-0 game.
Arsenal won 1-0 at Newcastle thanks to a goal from Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang while Leicester and Wolves drew 0-0 in the day’s other game.
Harry Maguire made his debut for United and they were ahead within 18 minutes when Kurt Zouma fouled Rashford and the England striker stepped up to convert it himself as United moved ahead early on.
Chelsea matched United for the next 45 minutes, with Emerson and Tammy Abraham both hitting the woodwork.
But Martial made it 2-0 on 65 minutes and two minutes later it was 3-0 when Rashford scored his second. Debutant James completed the scoring with a fourth nine minutes from time.
“The second half was outstanding, (we) defended well in shape and counter-attacked well,” United boss Ole Gunnar Solskjaer said.
“We can count ourselves a little bit lucky to go in 1-0 up, but then half-time came, we settled down and played well second half.”
Solskjaer was full of praise for new signings Maguire and Aaron Wan-Bissaka, who started, and James, who came off the bench to score.
“We’ve signed three fantastic boys, three fantastic personalities and we are delighted with them,” he said.
“Dan has made a great impact and it is the best feeling ever scoring a goal in front of the Stretford End, you cant beat that.”
Aubemayang scored the only goal as Arsenal made a winning start to the new season as they won 1-0 at Newcastle.
The Gabon striker notched the only goal 13 minutes into the second half to inflict a defeat on Steve Bruce in his first match as Newcastle manager.
“It was a very good three points, we played very solid and I also think we controlled a lot of the game over 90 minutes but we can improve more,” Arsenal manager Unai Emery.
“For our confidence that victory is very important, we played with some young players and that gave them the chance to improve.”
Leicester and Wolves drew 0-0 in the other early match, with the video assistant ruling out a Leander Dendoncker goal for Wolves because of a handball by Willy Boly in the build-up.
“It was a good game, two well-managed teams,” Leicester manager Brendan Rodgers said.
“At this time of the season it’s never going to be perfect but I’m really pleased with the attitude. At this level every point is important and if you cannot win you take a point and work hard to improve next week.”
Wolves manager Nuno Esperito Santo said he had not seen the hand ball and said he had mixed feelings about VAR.
“I haven’t seen the images but I trust them, if they saw it what can we do,” he said.
“What I’m concerned about, is let’s not ruin the game.
“Two minutes the game stopped. The anxiety of us celebrating, then we waited — it’s not the spirit of the game.”
RESULTS
Leicester 0 Wolves 0
Manchester United 4 (Rashford 18-pen, 67, Martial 65, James 81) Chelsea 0
Newcastle 0 Arsenal 1 (Aubameyang 58)
Manchester United’s Marcus Rashford celebrates after scoring a goal during the EPL match against Chelsea at Old Trafford yesterday. (AFP)
