Liam Rosenior reacts in sublime fashion to early test as Chelsea boss oversees stunning comeback win over West Ham

If success at Chelsea is contingent on how well you react to chaos and ineptitude, then credit to Liam Rosenior for passing one of those early tests of sanity that visit all coaches at Stamford Bridge eventually.

Not only did he retrieve three points from a hideous spot on a febrile, thrilling evening, he made another against those who once thought he wasn’t fit for this workplace.

Maybe, in time, it will get the better of him, as it has more experienced men and bigger names. But this was an occasion to savour, and one when his clarity of thought was directly responsible for rerouting this match away from being an abject embarrassment.

Let’s first go to half-time – West Ham were 2-0 up and riding their own wave. Two straight league wins was closing in on three and how comfortable they looked. Jarrod Bowen had scored one, Crysencio Summerville the other, and Aaron Wan-Bissaka made them both.

Rosenior? His every call had gone wrong. Cole Palmer was given a start and barely seemed to care and Alejandro Garnacho was tucked away in Wan-Bissaka’s pocket. The booing that greeted them at the break was vicious and deserved.

But how dramatically this game turned. Rosenior sent on Marc Cucurella and Joao Pedro to fix the mismatch playing out on their left flank and Wesley Fofana to cure a defence being put to shame. How did that go? Well, Fofana made a goal for Pedro, Cucurella levelled, and then Pedro made a stoppage-time winner for Enzo Fernandez.

Liam Rosenior reacted at half time with his side 2-0 down and couldn’t hide his jubliation

Jarrod Bowen had given West Ham an early lead within seven minutes to stun Stamford Bridge

If we measure a coach by their reactions, then this was sublime by Rosenior, who now has six wins from seven across all competitions and has resurrected the past two with his half-time substitutions. That this one ended with a brawl that saw Jean-Clair Todibo sent off was a superfluous layer of drama.

But you have to feel for Nuno Espirito Santo, who played Chelsea like a cheap fiddle in the first half and lacked the bench to compete after the break.

This will sting him, just as he was breathing life into West Ham’s relegation fight. With Manchester United, Liverpool and Manchester City scattered among their next six games, 2-0 leads cannot be lost.

In consideration of Rosenior, we ought to recognise that he was also responsible to an extent for the mess he went on to clean.

His approach here was no doubt conditioned by what comes next, with a Carabao Cup semi-final to resolve against Arsenal on Tuesday, but he made seven changes to the side that beat Napoli and that was a risk. This fixture got sticky quickly.

In the opening minute, Moises Caicedo was robbed in his own half by Pablo in one of those moments of carelessness that seem to recur with him. Great player, sure, but his mind can wander.

The subsequent finish from Taty Castellanos was poor, but at the very least a tone was set, culminating in Bowen’s early strike for 1-0. To be fair to West Ham, whatever fortune there was in the mechanics of the finish, they had earned with the move, which started with Wan-Bissaka bullying Garnacho in their chase of a long ball before feeding to Bowen.

His in-swinger would have been perfect as a cross for Pablo, but it aged better as a shot when the forward failed to make a connection. Poor old Robert Sanchez, he expected a touch that never came and was wrong-footed when the ball kept to its flight path for the far post.

Joao Pedro scored the first goal in Chelsea’s comeback to continue his impressive run of form

Marc Cucurella was brought on by Rosenior at half-time and scored his side’s second to level it

Jean-Clair Todibo was shown red for as tensions spilled over in the final minutes at the Bridge

For Rosenior, the worry was that patterns of the goal kept replicating, especially in the duel between Garnacho and Wan-Bissaka. The West Ham full-back dominated him over and again, both on the run and in defence.

Another facet was Chelsea’s vulnerability to the long ball – the second goal demonstrated as much. Rosenior’s back line was ludicrously high when West Ham launched into the swathes of space behind Jorrel Hato, from where Bowen played in Wan-Bissaka. Reading the run of Summerville, the pull-back was precise, as was the finish.

By then, Rosenior had also lost Jamie Gittens to injury and Palmer, starting for the first time in a fortnight, was anonymous. Drifting through the motions, he almost seemed disinterested. Bowen, all energy and menace, was his opposite in every meaningful way.

Rosenior’s response was to spin the wheel, with Pedro, Cucurella and Wesley Fofana sent on for Garnacho, Hato and Benoit Badiashile. There was some sympathy for Hato – Garnacho had left him exposed to overloads for the entirety of the first half – but that left flank was gaping liability.

Credit to Rosenior, his tinkering turned a weakness into a strength. First, Cucurella made a great chance for Liam Delap, who misjudged the angles on his finish, and then a Fofana cross and a Pedro header combined for 2-1.

After Caicedo and Valentin Castellanos traded near misses, the comeback was completed with an ugly goal. The key moment came when Malo Gusto looped his header over Alphonse Areola and Maximilian Kilman appeared to be shoved into a header against his own bar by Delap. The VAR would later rule no foul and Cucurella bundled the loose ball over the line.

A draw would have been an achievement, but then Fernandez triggered the ultimate mood shift at the death off a Pedro cut back. The mass brawl that followed a moment later at the other end only fed into the sense that madness is infectious at Chelsea. Thankfully, Rosenior seems to have a head for it.