Cole Palmer again. And again. And again. And once more for good measure. And for Robert Sanchez and Chelsea’s sake, thank heavens for that.
In a wonderfully frantic, flawed game, Chelsea’s talisman scored four before half-time to lead the Blues to a first home league win of Enzo Maresca’s tenure, and, despite Sanchez’s almost inadvertently aiding his former club, inflict Fabian Hurzeler’s first loss at the Brighton helm.
A 4-2 scoreline at the half-time whistle may have been unchanged by the last, but make no mistake, this was 90 minutes and change of bonkers football.
Palmer’s performance was magnificent, even if it should really have ended with a double hat-trick and two match balls. Brighton’s high line against Chelsea’s rapid forwards was hugely risky, and yet still could not match Sanchez for self-destruction as the goalkeeper gifted the Seagulls both of their goals.
The first saw Chelsea trail for the first time since the opening day; the second gave Brighton a route back into a game that the home side had only just seized.
In both instances, Palmer’s response was that of a young player by now well used to bearing hefty responsibility before his time. Indeed, after Chelsea’s increasingly impressive start to the season, built on swift collective growth under Maresca, this was a throwback to last term and the one-man Blues band.
Palmer’s finishes came in all forms: a calm steer into a vacated net, a trademark penalty and a clever low strike at the near post from Jadon Sancho’s pass. The hat-trick goal though was by streets the best, a free-kick bent wonderfully into the top corner from beyond 30 yards that had even the coolest, coldest man inside Stamford Bridge apparently surprised at himself.
No player had ever previously scored four in the first half of a Premier League match - and the absurd thing was that it could have been more.
In the chaotic quarter of an hour in which he scored his first three goals, Palmer also hit the post when clean through after a glorious touch and saw a further strike disallowed for offside.
Into the second half, this was one man playing a different sport - trying everything, most of it coming off. There was a lazy chip into Nicolas Jackson from which the striker should have scored, a touch and volley that dipped just too late, and a reverse into Noni Madueke that only he could have seen.
Palmer has not exactly made a slow start to the season, but unlike last term, others have chipped in and wrestled the headlines. Madueke began the season aflame, Sancho, as here, was excellent on debut at Bournemouth, and both Jackson and Christopher Nkunku have scored goals.
Meanwhile, Maresca has been wary about workload, leaving the Englishman out of his European squad, and Palmer himself has had to get used to closer, nastier attention from opponents - a second season syndrome of sorts for all the rarest young talents.
This, though, was an explosion; a belated hard launch a month into a campaign in which, such are his standards, the 22-year-old had already quietly accumulated two goals and four assists.
Any Brighton fans arriving in west London with a week’s worth of pent up fury were never going to lack for an outlet, three of their old boys named in the Chelsea starting XI, along with Levi Colwill, held in better regard after a season spent on loan at the Amex. Somehow, all four managed to involve themselves in the visitors’ opener.
First Moises Caicedo hesitated on the ball in his own box and passed the burden to Colwill, whose clearance was charged down. Sanchez then came out swinging for a ball that was never his, while Marc Cucurella never got off the ground as Georginio Rutter bravely headed in.
If Sanchez was the most culpable of the four for that goal, though - and certainly, he was - then for Brighton’s second the blame was not even shared. The Spaniard’s pass out was dreadful, picked off, and smashed home by the excellent Carlos Baleba.
All in all, this was a horrid afternoon for a goalkeeper who has, after winning the race to be No1 this summer, enjoyed a fine few weeks, headlined by a penalty save in the 1-0 win away at Bournemouth.
