It was not such a comfortable win for Jose Mourinho’s men as the score line suggests. After conceding an early goal, the hosts were lucky to go in at the break on level terms as the equaliser scored by Hazard should have been disallowed.

A good team move meant Eto’o scored his first Premier League goal to put the Blues’ 2-1 ahead and, after Mourinho was sent to the stands, Oscar and Hazard put some gloss to the score line with two late goals.

It started badly for the home side as a mistake by David Luiz led them to fall behind early on in the game. The centre-back weakly allowed the ball to roll through to Cech when Ramires played it back, but Jordon Mutch nipped in to score for Cardiff.

Despite having plenty of possession, Chelsea were unable to break down Cardiff with only a couple of John Terry headers to show for their efforts. In fact, they had to thank Petr Cech for keeping the score line at 0-1 when he made a superb save from Peter Odemwingie’s stunning free-kick.

However, Cardiff were unlucky to concede in the first half as Eto’o nicked the ball from goalkeeper David Marshall whilst he was bouncing it, and it subsequently led to Hazard’s first goal of the night.

Under the laws of the game, the ball is considered to be in the goalkeeper’s control when he bounces it and thus, referee Anthony Taylor should have blown for a foul and disallowed Chelsea’s opening goal.

Chelsea were failing to translate their dominance into goals but that changed midway through the first half as Eto’o scored after some good play by Hazard. The Bluebirds were not ready to back down and could have instantly drawn level as Kim Bo-Kyung drew a good save out of Cech.

Persistent complaining led to Mourinho’s dismissal from the technical area but that did not hinder his Chelsea side as they ran out comfortable winners in the end. Oscar and Hazard scored late on to make sure of the points and take Chelsea to second place in the table ahead of Liverpool on goal difference.