Eden Hazard happy with West Brom point
Eden Hazard has insisted that Chelsea's disappointing 1-1 draw against West Brom was a point gained, not two points lost.
Chelsea led through a first half Branislav Ivanovic header and looked on course to open up a five point lead over Arsenal.
But Victor Anichebe scored a late equaliser to give the Gunners the chance to reclaim their top spot against Manchester United tonight.
Despite a looking like a disappointing result for the Blues, Hazard believes there are plenty of positives to be taken from it.
“It’s still a point, even if many people are disappointed,” Hazard said to Chelsea’s official website. “I think this is a point that will count. There were some good things but others less so.
“You cannot win every game and it was important we didn’t lose. We’ll improve in the future and we will try to win the next game. We’ll see what happens when the other teams play.”
It was the second time in the space of a month that Chelsea have dropped points to relegation candidates having been held to a 0-0 stalemate at home to West Ham.
Hazard said, like West Ham, Pepe Mel's side made it hard for the creative players of Chelsea to express themselves.
“It was a puzzling game. At 1-0, I thought we were managing the match well but we couldn’t get the second goal which would have given us protection and then the game became difficult,” Hazard said.
“I tried to play, we tried to play, but it was a very difficult game. It was a complicated whenever I had the ball because there were two or three opponents there. We could have got one or two more goals if we had been a little smarter with our final passes.
“They had a plan to defend, as was the case when we played West Ham. It was a similar situation except at the end West Brom pushed a lot, their crowd got behind them and it became complicated.”
Chelsea face title rivals Manchester City in the FA Cup in their tie as they fight for a place in the quarter finals.
Chelsea led through a first half Branislav Ivanovic header and looked on course to open up a five point lead over Arsenal.
But Victor Anichebe scored a late equaliser to give the Gunners the chance to reclaim their top spot against Manchester United tonight.
Despite a looking like a disappointing result for the Blues, Hazard believes there are plenty of positives to be taken from it.
“It’s still a point, even if many people are disappointed,” Hazard said to Chelsea’s official website. “I think this is a point that will count. There were some good things but others less so.
“You cannot win every game and it was important we didn’t lose. We’ll improve in the future and we will try to win the next game. We’ll see what happens when the other teams play.”
It was the second time in the space of a month that Chelsea have dropped points to relegation candidates having been held to a 0-0 stalemate at home to West Ham.
Hazard said, like West Ham, Pepe Mel's side made it hard for the creative players of Chelsea to express themselves.
“It was a puzzling game. At 1-0, I thought we were managing the match well but we couldn’t get the second goal which would have given us protection and then the game became difficult,” Hazard said.
“I tried to play, we tried to play, but it was a very difficult game. It was a complicated whenever I had the ball because there were two or three opponents there. We could have got one or two more goals if we had been a little smarter with our final passes.
“They had a plan to defend, as was the case when we played West Ham. It was a similar situation except at the end West Brom pushed a lot, their crowd got behind them and it became complicated.”
Chelsea face title rivals Manchester City in the FA Cup in their tie as they fight for a place in the quarter finals.