Wolves 2-1 Chelsea: Pedro Neto’s injury-time goal sees hosts seal comeback win as visitors miss opportunity to go joint-top of the league

Wolves forward Pedro Neto scored his fourth goal of the season to steal all three points at the death against Chelsea.

The Blues took the lead early in the second half through Olivier Giroud, however were pegged back by the hosts when Daniel Podence’s strike deflected in off of Reece James and then Neto exposed Chelsea on the counter late on – to inflict the visitors to consecutive Premier League defeats for the first time this season.

Neto’s 95th-minute winner comes just three days after Wolves lost the West Midlands derby against Aston Villa via a penalty in the 94th minute.

And speaking post-match, Wolves manager Nuno Espirito Santo was happy to atone for that defeat: ‘We were disappointed three days ago [at losing late on to Aston Villa]. Football is until the last minute. It can happen to any team.

‘We were always in the game, we were well organised and in the second half we played really good football.’

In an extremely cagey first half, Frank Lampard’s men should have been ahead at half-time but Giroud saw his free header go over the goal, while Kurt Zouma rattled the crossbar with a header of his own.

However, Giroud got his goal soon after the break, to continue his fine form, when he volleyed Ben Chilwell’s low cross through Rui Patricio’s gloves – which creeped over the line.

The game changed with the introduction of Adama Traore off the hosts’ bench – who instantly caused panic among the Blues’ backline. 

It was the Spanish winger who drew the free-kick that led to the equaliser. From the resulting set-piece, Podence controlled the ball in the box before seeing his deflected strike beat Edouard Mendy at his near post.

Wolves were then awarded a penalty when Neto was adjudged to have been brought down in the box by James only for referee Stuart Atwell to reverse his original decision after consulting VAR.

Chelsea pushed more men forward in the dying embers of the game – in search of the winner that would have sent them joint-top of the league – however, they were caught on the counter-attack by Neto who drove at Zouma before drilling a low strike past Mendy with virtually the last kick of the game. 

By Sajidur Rahman