Chelsea beat Fulham 2-0 in a fiery West London Derby that was full of controversy.
Joao Pedro bagged his first goal at Stamford Bridge following his away strike last week to give Chelsea the advantage.
Enzo Fernandez’s second half penalty was enough to seal all three points.
Fulham did initially take the lead through young Josh King, but it was chalked off for a supposed foul in the build-up.
To compound the Cottagers’ misery, the officials at Stockley Park also awarded the penalty despite a potential handball from Joao Pedro in the passage of play.
The Blues started positively and put immediate pressure on Fulham’s goalkeeper Bernd Leno, whose mistake allowed Joao Pedro to get a shot off before Liam Delap’s stinging shot was blocked by Sander Berge following a nice move with Marc Cucurella.
That was to be Delap’s first and last involvement of the afternoon, as he pulled up with a hamstring issue soon after and was replaced by academy product Tyrique George.
Yet, it was Fulham’s youngster who thought he had broken the deadlock in the 21st minute, as 18-year-old Josh King raced clean through on goal and chopped onto his stronger right foot to stick the ball past Robert Sanchez – But VAR intervened as they adjudged Trevoh Chalobah to have been fouled on the ankle beforehand.
From there on, it was the visitors who took control of the game with long balls up to Rodrigo Muniz as the Cottagers were first to every knock down; The Spanish striker had a chance from just six yards that was remarkably saved by Sanchez, even if the offside flag was soon raised.
Four minutes into stoppage time at the end of the first half, Fulham created a wonderful chance for Timothy Castagne to aim at goal from inside the box, but Moises Caicedo threw a leg in the way to sniff out the danger in the nick of time.
Straight down at the other end, two successive corners culminated in Joao Pedro beating Calvin Bassy to the ball from close range to head the Blues into the lead – Marco Silva’s fiery temper finally boiled over as he was furious with the extra time allowed for the set piece.
Chelsea doubled their advantage in the 56th minute through Enzo Fernandez’s converted penalty kick, which was awarded after Ryan Sessegnon’s handball with his arm extended out from the body.
Joao Pedro came a whisker away from doubling his scoring tally midway through the second half, as Pedro Neto’s in swinging cross was almost met by the outstretched Brazilian, but no contact could be made.
Raul Jimenez had a free header on the end of an Adama Traore delivery to grab a late consolation, however the Portuguese centre-forward couldn’t compose himself as the ball rather bounced off of his head and far wide of the target.
The final chance of the match went to the visitors from a corner, which saw a header cleared off the line by the opening goal scorer as Chelsea’s clean sheet was preserved.