At the end of an exiting 90 minutes of football at the Lucas Oil Stadium (whose pitch was not in a good state anyway) in the American city of Indianapolis, the might of the Blues' rampant attack proved too strong for an Inter Milan side that was more comfortable sitting deep and waiting to hit their opponents on a counter. The Blues started the strongest and ended in the best possible fashion.Chelsea (4-2-3-1): Cech; Ivanovic, Cahill, Terry (c), Cole; Ramires, Van Ginkel; Hazard, Oscar, Moses; Lukaku. Subs: Schwarzer, Bertrand, Azpilicueta, D Luiz, Essien, Mikel, Mata, Torres, Ba.
Inter(3-5-2): Handanovic; Campagnaro, Ranocchia, Juan Jesus; Nagatomo, Guarin, Cambiasso, Alvarez, Pereira; Palacio; Icardi. Subs: Castellazzi, Carrizo, Jonathan, Andreolli, Belfodil, Kuzmanovic, Chivu, Mbaye, Capello, Olsen, Laxalt.
The first 10 minutes of play saw equal chances from both set of players as each of the teams sought to establish early dominance in the game. But the first clear chance of the game went to Inter Milan's Ricardo Alvarez in the 5th minute of play as he tested Chelsea goalie, Petr Cech with an effort that was never really going in. Both teams enjoyed spells of possession from that moment with Inter looking more likely to get the party started on a bad Lucas Oil Stadium pitch.
However, it took the Blues of England just 13 minutes to open their goal scoring accounts in Stateside as an excellent Chelsea buildup orchestrated by Nigeria's Victor Moses allowed Oscar (whom we all have come to associate with beautiful goals) to slot the ball beautifully into the net beyond the grasp of Handanovic, the Nerrazzuri goalkeeper. Fourteen minutes was what stood between Oscar's goal and Chelsea's second of the match as Victor Moses went to the ground just outside the 18-yard box, but all the same won a spot-kick for Chelsea which Belgian international, Eden Hazard, converted cheekily, looking away as he tapped the ball into the bottom right corner. Reminds me of Thierry Henry in his glory days at Arsenal.
Chelsea continued to dominate proceedings for the rest of the first half as Inter ran out of ideas when it came to knowing what to do with the ball (which they saw too infrequently as a matter of fact). The half-time subs were made; close-season signing Mark Schwarzer came in for the impressive Petr Cech, goal scorer Oscar was given a rest and Juan Mata came in in his place, while returning loanee, Michael Essien, came in to replace the impressive Victor Moses who had proved to be a handful for the Milan midfield and defence.
Chelsea and Inter entertained a capacity crowd at the Lucas Oil Stadium as the city got a rare chance to host some of soccer's biggest stars. Inter's Guarin had the ball in the back of the net in the 49th minute, but it was ruled off for a conspicuous offside. It was the turn of the Londoners to bite their nails in the 56th minute when Romelu Lukaku should have scored the third goal of the match (and his 4th in 4 consecutive preseason starts). The ball however refused to go in to the relief of the Milanese and their nervous manager, Walter Mazzarri. It bounced off the bar and came right off. Cruel.
Moments later Inter's bad dream turned into a nightmare midway through the second half. Campagnaro was given the marching orders by the referee for a nasty challenge on Blues captain John Terry. Terry looked to be in discomfort, but stayed on...typical JT. More substitutions were made by the two teams as the match went into a lull. Chelsea were content knocking the ball around the pitch as if they were in a training session somewhere in Cobham and Inter Milan was happy to sit back and absorb the pressure like they often do back home in Italy, until that opportune time when they will have the chance to hit the Blues on a deadly counter. But that was until the last 10 minutes of the match when there was a bit of a role reversal. The Inter Milan players were now on the attack and Chelsea did all they could to repel them with John Mikel Obi and Michael Essien combing well to shield the Chelsea back line. All in all, Chelsea came out tops at the end of 90 minutes of football and by so doing have qualified for the next stage of the Guinness International Champions Cup. They will play AC Milan on Sunday in New York city, while Inter Milan faces Valencia who lost to AC Milan on July 27.
Watch Oscar's amazing goal against Inter Milan at the Guiness International Champions Cup and the Full Match Highlights below
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