Ten-man Sunderland picked up their expected loss at Chelsea - but the 2-0 scoreline doesn't quite reflect the determination we fought with as we stayed in the game right until Frank Lampard's 75th minute penalty.

Roy Keane made two changes, as we went to a 4-5-1 formation against the former champions, with Dickson Etuhu replacing Andy Cole in the starting XI and Liam Miller replaced the injured Carlos Edwards as well. As for Chelsea, they were without Petr Cech, who had been tipped to return today, as John Obi Mikel and Andrei Shevchenko started up front for the Blues.

As expected, Sunderland were under the cosh from the start, with Shaun Wright-Phillips putting a shot wide in the second minute of the game, before Salomon Kalou saw a header cannon off the bar four minutes later. Joe Cole saw a cross caught by Darren Ward, as Wright-Phillips had a penalty claim denied as we had barely passed the ten minute mark in the game. It was more of the same as we constantly had to clear away crosses, but Chelsea eventually took the lead on 23 minutes when Andrei Shevchenko found Kalou's cross and had no problem converting it for his second league goal of the season.

From the restart, Sunderland once again found themselves unable to get a sniff of the ball, with Ward having to deny Belletti's driven shot on 26 minutes. It took another six minutes before we managed our first shot of the game, with Kenwyne Jones testing Carlo Cudicini with a left footed effort just after the half hour, shortly before Chelsea's Italian keeper had to take two attempts to save Grant Leadbitter's free kick, as the sides just wound down the time until the interval.

Sunderland did have a good spell early in the second half, with Grant Leadbitter going wide from 30 yards out, before Paul McShane's through ball to Kenwyne Jones somehow ended going straight through to Cudicini. McShane then had to cut out a cross from Shevchenko as we managed to get something of a foothold in the game, only without ever really looking like we were going to equalise.

Leadbitter and Jones saw more chances go wide, as Chelsea found themselves unable to mount any offence on Darren Ward's goal - prompting both sides into changes. Greg Halford managed to get far enough forward to launch a shot straight at Cudicini, but Sunderland gave away a daft penalty with seventeen minutes left, when Halford had fouled Joe Cole in the box. Frank Lampard converted the spot kick to put the game beyond doubt.

Daryl Murphy won a corner for us with a shot that got deflected out for a corner - except we wasted the corner yet again as it didn't even get past the first Chelsea defender. Liam Miller got himself sent off at the death for raising his hands towards John Terry after he'd given away a free kick on the Chelsea skipper. However, the home side were more than happy to settle for a 2-0 win and pick up all three points at the Bridge.

Sunderland: Ward, Halford, McShane, Higginbotham, Collins, Miller (OFF 87), Etuhu, Whitehead, Leadbitter (sub 70, Stokes), Wallace, Jones (sub 66, Murphy). Subs: Gordon, Yorke, Cole.

Chelsea: Cudicini, Belletti, Alex, Terry, A Cole, Wright-Phillips, Lampard, Mikel, J Cole (sub 85, Sidwell), Kalou (sub 66, Pizarro), Shevchenko. Subs: Hilario, Bridge, Ben-Haim.