Chelsea's quest for the defence of their Champions League title took a hit on Wednesday night as the Blues lost 1-0 to Juventus in Italy.
The defending champions were looking to bounce back from their premier league loss against Manchester City over the weekend and were without N'Golo Kante, who had contracted Covid-19 and was in self-isolation.
Juventus were not without their own problems as their main strikers, Alvaro Morata and Paulo Dybala were both missing through injury.
Romelu Lukaku was the first to test the waters with a strike in the 7th minute, meeting a cross from Marco Alonso, only to be denied by Wojciech Szczesny, who gathered the ball on the second attempt.
Juventus failed to capitalize on a defensive error by Chelsea in the 20th minute when Matteo Kovacic lost the ball to allow Federico Chiesa run at the Chelsea goal. The Italian had an option of Fernando Bernadeschi joining him in the box, but decided to go himself from a more difficult angle, firing off the left side of the post, much to the fury of his teammate.
Adrien Rabiot was next to have a go in the 31st minute. The French midfielder, who has only scored six times in his two years at Turin cut in from the left side of attack to release a shot with his weaker right foot, that did nothing to trouble Edouard Mendy in goal.
Another goal-scoring opportunity was denied Juventus by their own player, Rabiot, when he got in the way of a Bernadeschi free kick just few minutes before the interval.
Having controlled better part of the first half and created more chances, Juventus picked up immediately after the interval, needing just 10 seconds after the restart to go ahead.
Bernadeschi and Chiesa, who were leading the attack in the absence of Dybala and Morata combining well again. The former released the latter on the left side of the box and the latter hit a well placed side-footed shot into the left corner, leaving no chance to Mendy.
It was almost unbelievable that the Old Lady were not two goals up four minutes after the hour mark. A cross-field ball from Rabiot was well placed for Bernadeschi by Juan Cuadrado, but the Italian disappointingly missed from six yards out.
The introduction of Callum Hudson-Odoi for Chelsea in the 62nd minute to replace Hakim Ziyech proved impactful for the Blues as he mesmerized the Juve defence on the right side of attack, albeit Chelsea were unable to materialize anything from this.
The England youth international was on it again in the 74th minute, after beating his man on the near side, lifting a cross into the box with Kai Havertz and Lukaku lurking. Havertz tried to get to the ball and misses, which puts off Lukaku and the striker couldn't guide his header towards goal.
An opportunity, similar to the one converted by Juventus was presented to their visitors in the 83rd minute. Substitute, Ross Barkley played Lukaku in on the left side of attack in the box, however the Belgian could not manage to bring his strike down towards goal.
The final chance of the game came to Chelsea in the final minutes of additional time. Ben Chilwell lifted a corner into the middle of the box for Havertz to attack. The German narrowly headed above the bar.
Concluding Thoughts
It was a disappointing outing for Chelsea as they failed to really trouble Szczesny in goal and were condemned to their second straight loss in all competitions.
Before last night's game, the Blues had only conceded four times since the beginning of last season in the competition and the loss ends a run of 12 games unbeaten in the group stage of the competition.
Thomas Tuchel knows that his team has all the quality to bounce back and will be looking to pick things up quickly to avert any late drama in the group.
On the flip side, Juventus continue their fine run in the group stage of the competition, having won 12 of their last 13 matches.
Despite having a poor start to the season, Max Allegri would be glad that his team has gotten the maximum points from two Champions league game as they go in search of the trophy that has evaded them in recent years.
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