Blues in seventh heaven as Mount hits hat-trick as Chelsea thrash Norwich 7-0 at the Bridge

By Paul Lagan at Stamford Bridge

Chelsea 7 v Norwich City 0

Mason Mount smashed his first goals of the season – a hat-trick as Chelsea blasted bottom of the league Norwich City into near oblivion, winning 7-0 at Stamford Bridge.

With no recognised strikers in Timo Werner and Romelu Lukaku due to injury, this was a game where others had to step up.

Mount showed his class and mental strength to score from his retaken penalty, while Callum Hudson-Odoi produced a thrilling, attacking performance and was rewarded with a goal.

Other strikes came from Ben Chilwell, Reece James and a own goal from Max Aarons.

Only Kai Havertz, who needed to produce, failed to – he was ultimately substituted by head coach Thomas Tuchel.

Hudson-Odoi was screamed at by Tuchel within two minutes of the start – demanding he push forward more.

He responded positively.

Within six minutes, the winger picked up the ball in midfield, ran back towards his own half, but only to gain space.

He instantly turned and sprinting along the left wing. The ball was arrowed into the Norwich penalty area, and when the clearance fell to Mount at the edge of the box, the dynamic midfielder drove a low, right-footer past Tim Krul to put the Blues 1-0 up. It as Mount’s first goal of the season.

The winger was in the mood to impress and he created space for himself and latched onto a defence-splitter of a ball from Mateo Kovacic. Hudson-Odoi showed composure and smoothly side-passed the ball past Krul to double the score on 18 minutes.

Hudson-Odoi, 20, set up Mount out again on 30 minutes, but the England man’s first-time strike when straight to Krul.

Number three was a beauty.

Starting on the left by Hudson-Odoi, he passed the ball to Mateo Kovacic who moved it further across the pitch to Mount. He produced the perfect ball to overlapping James, who clipped the ball over Krul and into the empty net.

Norwich, while out of the game in terms of the result almost scored on the 54th minute when Chilwell’s  back pass allowed substitute Militao Rashica to latch onto the ball and edge into the Chelsea penalty area. But Mendy turned from goalkeeper to centre-half and won a great block tackle to clear the ball to safety.

That was a minor respite for the Canaries and another sweeping move found Chilwell at left apex of the Norwich penalty area.

He took one touch before slicing home into Krul’ s far post to make it 4-0.

Krul then was unfortunate not to get to the ball and save it on 62 minutes.

Hudson-Odoi’s left byline cross took a glancing deflection off defender Max Aarons. Krul could not adjust in time and the ball bounced off his body into the back of the net.

Aarons was given the own goal as his deflection sent the ball goal-bound.

Ruben Loftus-Cheek entered the fray on 63 minutes replacing Jorginho.

It got worse for the visitors when Ben Gibson was sent off fo a needless lunge on James. It was his second yellow card, so he trudged off the pitch to leave his teammates to play out the final 25 minutes with 10 men.

Hakim Ziyech and Ross Barkley came on – Hudson-Odoi and Havertz went off.

The Blues got a spot kick when Rudiger’s shot was handled in the penalty area by Mathias Normann.

But referee Andrew Madley gave a corner instead. VAR intervened and Daley checked the monitor and award a penalty.

Up stepped Mount, but his shot was well saved by Krul.

But again VAR intervened, saying Krul was off his line.

Mount opted to take the kick again. This time Krul went one way, the ball down the middle.

Despite Krul’s left shin clipping the ball, it ended up in the back of the net for number six, with five minutes left on the clock.

Number seven and Mount’s hat-trick was simplicity itself.

Deep into added time, Loftus-Cheek got free on the right, raced into the area, cut the ball back and Mount ticked the ball home.

VAR looked at a possible offside for Loftus-Cheek but decided the midfielder was just onside.

Teams: Chelsea, Mendy, Rudiger, Jorginho, Silva, Kovacic, Chalobah, Mount, Hudson-Odoi, Chilwell, James, Havertz.

Subs: Kepa, Alonso, Christensen, Loftus-Cheek, Saul, Barkley, Ziyech, Azpilicueta, Sarr

Norwich, Krul, Aaron, Gibson, Hanley, Kabak, Normann, Lees-Melou , Pukki, McLean, Sargent, Giannoulis 

subs: Gunn, Rupp, Dowell, Rashica, Tzalis, Sorensen, Williams, Idah, Omabamidele

Referee: Andrew Madley