by Chelsea swept aside Noah’s Armenian side as second-string Enzo Maresca won 8-0 at Stamford Bridge.
The Europa Conference League had been a testing ground for the head coach to exploit his enviable strength in depth and, after scoring four goals in each of their first two matches, his replacements raised the bar for explode the visiting team with six goals scored. in the first half, demonstrating a gulf in class.
Tosin Adarabioyo and Marc Guiu celebrated their first Chelsea goals since joining, Joao Felix took the opportunity to impress with two more, while there were also goals for Axel Disasi and, most impressively, Mykhailo Mudryk whose curler from outside the box was the pick of them.
Christopher Nkunku scored twice after the break, including a penalty, to cement his place at the top of the Chelsea goalscoring charts.
Noah’s coach Rui Mota said before kick-off that his team had not come to London simply to defend and the first half gave a bitter irony to those words as Chelsea tore the sides apart. Armenians with unimaginable ease.
Four times in the first 21 minutes, beleaguered visiting goalkeeper Ognjen Chancharevich collected the ball out of his net, first when Adarabioyo lost his man at a corner and leaned down to glance at Enzo’s cross Fernandez through the goal and inside.
Defender Goncalo Silva gave the ball away almost from the kick-off, allowing Guiu to steal and double the lead, then Disasi headed a goal almost identical to the first, taking advantage of another delivery from Fernandez to score his fourth goal at Chelsea.
Noah actually had the first chance of the match, Goncalo Gregorio lobbing the ball straight at Filip Jorgensen after a quick counter-attack, and although their defense was an inconsistent mess, there were moments of skill in the attacking third which briefly worried Chelsea.
That early threat was a distant memory by the time Félix scored the first of his two goals and it was another mistake from the hapless Silva, meekly losing possession and allowing Fernandez – captain of the evening after losing his place in Maresca’s Premier League XI – to feed Felix for a simple finish.
That’s four goals in nine minutes of blitzkrieg, a signal for Chelsea to briefly retreat. If they intended to take it easy afterward with Noah, no one told Mudryk, who launched a fifth as sublime as any this ground had seen on European nights.
Felix’s attack may have gone wide before captain Hovhannes Hambartsumyan swung a leg and diverted it into the corner to make it 6-0.
All that was missing was a goal for Nkunku. He was denied twice in the second half, first by Chancharevich and then by the crossbar as he searched for his ninth of the campaign.
Finally his luck ran out with 20 minutes to go when the ball came back to him for the goalkeeper to squeak in the rebound inside the near post.
Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall won a penalty allowing the French international to complete the rout.
