Chelsea opened their Premier League campaign with victory over an Everton side who surely have more players injured than available now.
Jorginho converted from 12 yards after Ben Chilwell was fouled in the area by Abdoulaye Doucoure.
That broke a deadlock that had largely been untroubled until then, as both Everton and Chelsea struggled to dust off the cobwebs of pre-season.
James Tarkowski forced a fine save from Edouard Mendy and Doucoure perhaps should have atoned for his earlier mistake by scoring from an uncleared corner.
Thiago Silva also blocked well after Demarai Gray broke beyond the last line of defence.
Raheem Sterling would have scored on his competitive Chelsea debut were it not for a phenomenal last-gasp intervention from Vitaliy Mykolenko.
The forward, who had a first-half goal ruled out when he was offside from the rebound of an N’Golo Kante shot, had directed an effort towards Jordan Pickford’s goal from Marc Cucurella’s pull back.
Cucurella made his first Blues appearance since joining from the bench, while Kalidou Koulibaly also started.
Everton’s defeat was compounded by injuries to Ben Godfrey and Yerry Mina. The former was stretchered off early on with an ankle problem and the latter hobbled off shortly after the hour mark.
More to follow.
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