Teams will pay the penalty against Torres, Hazard and co

Three games and three wins have made for a great start to the Premier League season for Chelsea. And there have been three penalties – one in each match.

No doubt fans of other clubs think referees have been favouring us or assume our forwards have been diving.

The truth is the style of play Chelsea have employed so far this season is always likely to generate penalties.

When you spend a lot of time attacking, with tricky, skilful players such as Torres, Hazard and Mata taking defenders on in the box time and time again over 90 minutes, it’s almost inevitable that at some point they will get fouled in the area.

And so it’s a trend which could continue as the season progresses, unless teams start to specifically tailor their defensive formations to keeping us pushed back out of the area as much as possible – though that of course could just leave space behind the defenders for Torres to run into.

Torres has made a good start to the season. There was a suggestion his goal against Reading was offside but he has looked dangerous in every game and his finish against Newcastle, curling the ball into the top corner with the outside of his boot, was sublime.

He looks every bit like a striker who will score 20-plus goals this season.

He linked up with Eden Hazard for that goal, the Belgian back-heeling the ball into Torres’s path, and it almost goes without saying Hazard has been a revelation so far, adapting to the Premier League like he has played in it for years.

And while the focus has been on Hazard, Juan Mata has been quietly causing plenty of trouble for opponents while the attention has been elsewhere. His movement against Newcastle caused huge problems for a team that won 2-0 at Stamford Bridge less than four months ago.

One of the reasons for that defeat at the tail end of last season was that Roberto Di Matteo had to leave much of his first team out to rest them for the FA Cup final just three days later. This time he was without John Terry and Frank Lampard and yet it was hard to spot their absence, so assured and dominant were Chelsea.

It does make sense to rest Lampard every now and again, now he is 34 years old. But he won’t want to be missing too many games this season – because chances are we’re going to get a lot of penalties.

James Clarke is the author of Moody Blues: Following the second-best team in Europe

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