A Fernando Torres hat-trick stunned Mark Hughes’ lowly Queens Park Rangers side on a wet and windy Sunday afternoon at Stamford Bridge.
Manager Roberto Di Matteo made six changes to the Chelsea side that overturned Barcelona in mid-week. Torres replaced Didier Drogba up front, with Paulo Ferreira and Jose Bosingwa taking the place of Gary Cahill and Branislav Ivanovic in defence. Mark Hughes’ QPR side was left largely unchanged from their last top-flight outing.
Di Matteo was well aware going into the match that a win against their London rivals would keep the blues’ hopes alive for grabbing 4th place and that all important Champions League spot.
The home side opened the scoring in the 1st minute when Daniel Sturridge received a cut back from Ashley Cole down the left before firing a right-footed strike past Paddy Kenny despite the awkward angle.
John Terry scored a second for the Blues ten minutes later, with Fernando Torrescrashing the back of the net soon after that. Six minute after his inital goal, Torres scored a second, this time the striker took advantage of a Nedum Onouha blunder when he tried to head the ball back to keeper Paddy Kenny.
Torres clinched his hat-trick ten minutes after the break when he received a marvelous Mata through ball before firing a superb strike into the back of the net.
Chelsea grabbed a sixth ten minutes from time, this time through Florent Malouda. Despite being six goals down, Djibril Cisse slotted home for QPR four minutes later, but sadly for Cisse the damage had already been done and the points were Chelsea’s.
Chelsea welcome 5th placed Newcastle United in mid-week, the Magpies are a point ahead of Roberto Di Matteo’s side and are equal with Tottenham Hotspur in 4th place after Spurs’ 2-0 win over Blackburn on Sunday afternoon.
Attendance at Stamford Bridge: 41,675
Goalscorers: Daniel Sturridge 1′, John Terry 13′, Fernando Torres 19′, Fernando Torres 25′, Fernando Torres 64′, Florent Malouda 80′, Djibril Cisse 84′.