Cole Palmer's heroics help Chelsea seal late win over Palmeiras

Chelsea will continue their march in the Club World Cup after brushing past Palmeiras in the quarter-final of the Club World Cup.

Chelsea seemed up for it. They demonstrated their readiness for the physical demands of the game, as Brazilian teams in this competition have repeatedly shown.

That was emphasised in Marc Cucurela’s handling of Estevao Willian – the brand new Chelsea signing set to be officially unveiled in a matter of weeks.

The instructions from Enzo Maresca must have been to cover every blade of grass. Every Chelsea player showed high levels of physicality.

But that grit was accompanied by top talent. It didn’t take long for Pedro Neto to begin striding past his marker, Wanderlan. Cole Palmer was ready for a great night.

Not just how he scored his goal in the 16th minute. But he kept asking for the ball and seemed ready to go past players.

Palmer has been quietly impacting games in this tournament, but he went levels up in Philadelphia on Friday.

The positive mood got the best of Christopher Nkunku.

The Frenchman man largely accused of not showing interest in the last six months, barely lost possession of the ball and was involved in the entirety of the first half.

Palmeiras fans were full of color and loud in their voices, and they pushed their players for an equalizer. And in the second half, they delivered.

Estevao, struggling to make a mark on the game at this point, received the ball in the penalty area and went directly at his marker before hitting a piledriver past Robert Sanchez, onto the crossbar before crossing the goalline.

It was a stunning goal – a thing of beauty. A snippet of what Chelsea fans can expect of him. His celebration, though, was not considerate of his new lovers.

The Brazilians in the stands grew louder, and their players’ confidence was buoyed at this point. Palmeiras, on the up, would not look back as they chased the winning goal.

Chelsea responded with the introduction of new signing Joao Pedro and Noni Madueke, who is the subject of transfer reports with links to Arsenal. They replaced Liam Delap and Nkunku, respectively.

Pedro was effective. Not decisive enough, but he was lively and quite entertaining.

His hold-up play and ability to get involved with the play were good. It was that hold-up play that created a dangerous free-kick for Chelsea deep in the second half.

Maresca will lick his lips at the prospect of that option going into next season.

As Palmer’s influence on the game waned, Estevao continued to cause trouble for Chelsea’s defence. However, Chelsea’s breakthrough came through an unfancied scorer.

Malo Gusto hit a cross dangerously into the box that awkwardly flew past the Palmeiras goalkeeper after a deflection by Weverton.

Chelsea continued to search for the third goal of the game but the Palmeiras defence foiled countless attacks.

Maresca’s side move on to the semi-final and will face Fluminense, who beat Al Hilal in the other quarter-final.

Speaking after the game, Cole Palmer heaped praise on Estevao Willian after seeing the 18-year-old close up in Chelsea’s defeat of Palmeiras.

“He’s a top player. Obviously, he’s only young as well,” Palmer said.

“When he comes to England, people need to give him time to adapt to the culture, the language.

“He’s still only 18 or 19 but you can see he’s got amazing quality and we look forward to seeing him.”