Chelsea managed to jump up to third place in the English Premier League points table after managing to win a 5-goal thriller against Crystal Palace on Tuesday. Frank Lampard’s men survived a few late scares to hold on to a 3-2 victory at the Selhurst Park and they now carry a point lead over fourth-placed Leicester City.

Olivier Giroud, Christian Pulisic and Tammy Abraham scored for the visitors, while Wilfried Zaha and Christian Benteke had kept their team in the contest every time Chelsea dared to seal the fate of the match.

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The Blues owe their opening goal to a stroke of luck as Gary Cahill suffered an untimely injury while chasing Willian. It allowed the Brazilian winger to run free into the Crystal Palace box before he found unmarked Giroud.

The French World Cup winner comfortably tapped the ball into the back of the net to cause a dismay among the Crystal players who expected Chelsea to show a sporting spirit to their former captain and not take the goal. But nothing of that sort happened as the Londoners celebrated their breakthrough in the sixth minute.

Even though Crystal Palace looked all pumped up to give Chelsea a hard bargain for the points, they failed to cause much threat in their opponent’s box. Instead, it was the visitors who went up by another goal with an impeccable counter-attack.

After Mason Mount won the ball back and initiated the attack, he found Willian who in turn provided his second assist of the day, this time to Christian Pulisic.

The 21-year-old American, who has been touted as Eden Hazard’s replacement in the Stamford Bridge, launched a powerful strike off the inside of the near post to take Chelsea 2-0 up and continue his brilliant form since the resumption of English top-flight football.

However, what followed soon after has been a disturbing highlight for the Lampard’s Londoners. At a time when the game seemed perfectly titled in Chelsea’s favour, they conceded and put themselves in a threatening position.

Crystal’s Ivorian striker Wilfried Zaha put on display his exceptional goal-scoring ability as he thundered a curling long-ranger from outside the box which breached Chelsea’s defence and went past keeper Kepa Arrziabalaga to restore some pride for the hosts in the 34th minute.

The second half saw Crystal Palace raising the intensity of their attack and the fear of giving away the lead made Lampard introduce a double change in his frontline. His decision paid dividends as both of his substitutes, Ruben Loftus-Cheek and Tammy Abraham, combined and the latter scored for Chelsea to regain their two-goal lead in the 71st minute.

However, Crystal refused to have Chelsea an easy breath and made the scoreline 3-2 when a brilliant move culminated in Patrick van Aanholt squaring for Benteke to tap in just his second goal of the season.

The questions that were raised during their 2-3 defeat against West Ham United were also thrown by Crystal Palace. The Chelsea defense looked vulnerable as usual in front of a determined attack and had it not been for an inch-perfect tackle of Benteke from Kurt Zouma, the west London team would have returned with just a point.