London, Aug 31: Big-spending Chelsea were held to a 2-2 draw by Blackburn Rovers on Saturday, dropping their first points of the English premier league season. Blackburn took a shock lead after only 19 seconds through striker Andy Cole, when he spun and hit home Matt Jansen's cross following a stumble by Marcel Desailly as he tried to keep the ball in play. With owner Roman Abramovich, who has already spent 100 million pounds (158 million US dollars) on new players, watching from the stands the London club were unlucky not to draw level midway through the half when Adrian Mutu appeared to have scored, but the referee disallowed it for offside. But the Romanian striker showed his class just before the break when he beautifully finished off a move carved out by Juan Veron, Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink and Frank Lampard. Chelsea's Carlo Cudicini did well to push a David Thompson free-kick over the bar shortly before making an uncharacteristic error that led to Blackburn's second goal. Thompson sent over a routine-looking cross, which Cudicini fumbled, presenting Cole with an easy chance from close range. Chelsea levelled in more controversial circumstances on 63 minutes when the referee judged Lucas Neil to have handled a cross from Geremi. Hasselbaink made no mistake from the penalty spot.


Even the introduction of 16.8 million pound (26.28 million US dollars) new signing Hernan Crespo as a late substitute for Mutu was not enough to get Chelsea the three points.


English league soccer standings after matches played on Saturday : Premier league P W D L F A Pts 1. Arsenal 3 3 0 0 8 1 9 2. Manchester United 3 3 0 0 7 1 9 3. Portsmouth 4 2 2 0 7 2 8 4. Manchester City 3 2 1 0 7 3 7 5. Chelsea 3 2 1 0 6 4 7 6. Birmingham City 3 2 1 0 2 0 7 7. Fulham 3 2 0 1 7 5 6 8. Blackburn Rovers 4 1 2 1 11 8 5 9. Liverpool 4 1 2 1 4 2 5 10. Charlton Athletic 4 1 2 1 6 5 5 11. Leeds United 4 1 2 1 6 6 5 12. Aston Villa 4 1 1 2 4 5 4 13. Everton 4 1 1 2 6 8 4 14. Tottenham Hotspur 4 1 1 2 2 5 4 15. Southampton 3 0 3 0 2 2 3 16. Leicester City 4 0 2 2 4 7 2 17. Bolton Wanderers 4 0 2 2 2 10 2 18. Newcastle United 3 0 1 2 3 5 1 19. Middlesbrough 4 0 1 3 4 10 1 20. Wolverhampton Wanderers 4 0 1 3 1 10 1


Bureau Report