Cole Palmer struck a first-half hat-trick as Chelsea beat Wolves 3-1 at Molineux to make it four Premier League wins from four under Liam Rosenior.
After a tough spell for the England forward, marred by fitness issues, a dearth of goals and reports he is unsettled, this was a return of the free-scoring talisman that for so long carried the team but who now looks just one part of a balanced side brimming with promise.
Two of his strikes were penalties given away by dreadful Wolves defensive decisions but converted impeccably, before a third effort finished off at the end of a flowing Chelsea move made him the club’s all-time record hat-trick scorer in the Premier League era, with four.
That took him ahead of such Blues royalty as Frank Lampard, Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink and Didier Drogba.
Rosenior’s Chelsea have a long road to match the honours brought to Stamford Bridge by that trio, but this was further evidence of the soundness of the head coach’s appointment as the visitors cruised through against admittedly limited opposition.
Rob Edwards’ team were abysmal in the first half but much improved in the second, by which time they trailed by three in the driving Wolverhampton rain and were long beaten.
Tolu Arokodare scored to turn supporters’ jeers briefly into cheers but their team remain 18 points from 17th place and Championship-bound.
Matt Doherty set the tone of a desperate first half with a needless foul inside the box after 13 minutes.
Joao Pedro was nowhere near the goal and carrying the ball away from it but the Wolves captain nevertheless hung out careless a foot and tripped him. From the spot, Palmer coolly found the bottom corner.
Marc Cucurella and Moises Caicedo had shots blocked and then Enzo Fernandez failed to get enough lift on the ball to beat Jose Sa, the Wolves goalkeeper then producing his best to keep out Malo Gusto’s near-post blast.
Wolves appeared to be competing over who could give away the most ridiculous penalty.
Yerson Mosquera was next to drive a nail into his team’s coffin, a clear two-handed shove in the back of Pedro who again was a safe distance from goal and Palmer was once more the beneficiary from 12 yards.
Chelsea’s third, they had to work for, though nowhere near as hard as Edwards would have liked. Fernandez picked the ball up on the left and fed the overlapping Cucurella, whose pull-back was slammed into the roof of the goal by Palmer.
Wolves fans felt decisions had gone against them, particularly a penalty not given when Mateus Mane went down in the box and a yellow card shown to Adam Armstrong on his debut for fouling Andrey Santos. It was hard to know whether the half-time boos were meant for their own team or for the officials.
Things could hardly get worse and there was finally some spirit shown at the start of the second half.
Mane hit a post with a clever curling effort, Chelsea could only shovel it away for a corner, from which Arokodare stabbed in his team’s first league goal since January 7.
