Joao Felix’s Chelsea debut couldn’t have gone any worse after the Portuguese superstar was sent off for a horror tackle as Fulham secured a 2-1 win with former Blues star Willian haunting his old club.
Felix, who moved to Stamford Bridge from Atletico Madrid on a six-month loan deal and was announced just over 24 hours ago, started brightly and was lively in attack.
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However, his attacking endeavour was not able to produce any goods as Fulham took the lead through Willian.
The Brazilian winger’s effort was deflected past a helpless Kepa Arrizabalaga in goal in the 25th minute.
Although Graham Potter’s side couldn’t find a way through Fulham in the first half, it took just two minutes after the interval to find the equaliser.
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It was centre-back Kalidou Koulibaly who got his second league goal of the year to offer Chelsea a way back into the contest.
But the joy would last a little over ten minutes as Felix, who initially joined Atletico Madrid for a staggering $AUD195 million in 2019, flew into a challenge with his studs raised and gave the referee an easy decision to send him off.
The red card means Felix, who Chelsea shelled out $17m to sign him on loan, will cost the Blues $2.4m for the ensuing three-game suspension he has earned.
Fulham didn’t take terribly long to take advantage of their extra man, as a deep inswinging cross from the right was met by Carlos Vinicius and nodded into the back of the net.
Vinicius, deputising for the suspended Aleksandr Mitrovic, took great delight in scoring the winner as Kepa’s indecisiveness of whether to come for the cross proved costly.
Despite late chances, Chelsea simply could not find a way past a resolute Fulham outfit who now sit above Liverpool in the table, while Potter’s side slipped further away in the race for European football next season.
