So Sunday’s game gave Chelsea the opportunity to reclaim top spot in the division outright with a win or a draw. Fortunately for Chelsea despite coming up against a very resilient, in-form side in Tony Pulis’ West Bromwich Albion the Blues managed to extend their already impressive 8 game winning streak. The victory made it 9 wins on the bounce, as they reclaimed top spot on their own courtesy of Diego Costa and now puts them 3 points ahead of Arsenal in 2nd.

Keeping Chelsea off the scoreboard always seemed unlikely when history suggested that Antonio Conte’s team would certainly score at least 1 goal against the Baggies. The Blues had scored in every one of their previous 21 home league games against West Brom and you have to go all the way back to December of the 1967-68 season to find the last time Chelsea failed to bulge the net against West Brom.

Conte selected an unchanged line-up with the exception of the insertion of the now fit-again Nemanja Matic to replace Cesc Fabregas in the Chelsea midfield engine room. Conte even used Willian as an early second half substitute to replace Pedro as he did to such great effect last week against Manchester City. This week however Willian was unable to respond with a goal after entering the game but he may have added that bit of energy which enabled Chelsea to find a way through West Brom’s stubborn defence. Arguably the best chance of the first half came when N’Golo Kante took a shot from outside the box and it deflected off Pedro’s shins and seemed destined for the goal before ultimately hitting the side netting. West Brom were lucky not to concede as keeper Ben Foster was beaten.

Chelsea did of course break the deadlock and it was no surprise when on 76 minutes it was Diego Costa who seized on an error by West Brom centre-back Gareth McCauley and finished off a determined run with another clinical finish as he curled a sublime left footed strike past Ben Foster for his league leading 12th goal of the season. You can certainly put forward a compelling case for Costa as the hottest striker in world football right now – he has been virtually transformed from a good striker to an unstoppable superstar striker under Antonio Conte. The win gave Chelsea another valuable 3 points on a day when they only managed one other shot on target – a 30 yard David Luiz free-kick in the first half. Luiz put in another fine all-around display after passing a late fitness test plus Victor Moses also put in a great shift for Chelsea and at this stage of the season the Nigerian looks like a shoo-in for most improved player of the season.

So Chelsea really are beginning to look like Premier League winners as today they pulled off the win despite not being at their very best. Delivering a win in a tight contest which they had to win the hard way shows Chelsea certainly have what it takes to become Champions and today’s victory likely gave Antonio Conte and his players as much satisfaction and pleasure as any of their high-scoring wins. The 1-0 result clearly illustrates that they can get down in the trenches to win ugly if it is required as they just kept on going throughout the game until they broke down Tony Pulis’ hard-working West Brom team.