Chelsea dominated a game they deserved to win but they lost their fifth penalty shoot-out in succession.In the first half Chelsea give a display that was a pleasure to watch.
Forty-five minutes of intricate passing, superb ball control, exquisite movement and a superb finish to give Chelsea a deserved half time lead.
On a pitch that was far better than the one played on in Malaysia, Luiz Felipe Scolari would have been a happy man at half time as he contemplated making some changes to give a few others some match practise.
With the game played at a faster pace than the bland affair between AC Milan and Sevilla that was witnessed earlier, it took Chelsea twenty-seven minutes to take advantage.
The goal came after Ferreira had freed Deco down the right and his cross into the box was chested, expertly, into the path of Michael Essien by Nicolas Anelka. Essien took aim and thundered an eighteen yard left foot shot past the keeper, Pelizzoli.
Other chances saw Essien fire over in the ninth minute after good work involving Deco and Anelka whilst Lampard fired narrowly over from the corner of the box whilst Deco volleyed wide in a repeat of that corner attempted in the Far East.
Locomotiv's best effort came when an audacious shot, from forty yards, by Glushakov, sailed just over Petr Cech`s bar.
If the second half performance were to match the first half performance then we`re in for an interesting season. Unfortunately, Locomotiv hadn`t read the script and in the end Chelsea were left to rue some great missed opportunities.
Locomotiv started the second half at a greater tempo and pushed higher up the pitch forcing a succession of corners. It took The Blues a while to address the issue but once they did they created some great chances. Ricardo Carvalho, advancing out of defence, delivered a great cross but Anelka couldn`t quite direct his header towards goal. Wright-Phillips then saw a shot deflected wide before wasting a golden chance to finish the game off by shooting wide when bearing down on goal from the right.
With six minutes left, Essien was harshly penalised twenty-four yards out and Kambalov lashed the free kick low and hard and in off the post. Both sides went for the winner but it was to be penalties in Moscow again.
When Cech saved the first it looked as if we were in with a chance but when the Russian side then showed clinical efficiency netting their next four, you just knew the efforts of Lampard, Deco, Wright-Phillips and Essien would be in vain.
This time those unfortunate enough to miss were Bridge and Shevchenko giving Locomotiv a final against Sevilla and Chelsea a meaningless fixture against AC Milan for third or fourth place.
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