Chelsea capped another seismic day in the Stamford Bridge club’s history by narrowly avoiding an FA Cup shock, edging past Luton 3-2 at Kenilworth Road.
Romelu Lukaku tapped home Timo Werner’s cross late on to thwart the Hatters’ dreams of a first quarter-final since 1994, on the day when Roman Abramovich signalled the impending end of his Blues reign.
Werner scored and made both Chelsea’s other goals on a solid night for the Germany forward, with Saul Niguez also clipping home.
Any notions of a nice and easy night were abruptly ended as soon as the unchallenged Reece Burke thumped in a second-minute header for the second-tier hosts.
Harry Cornick’s collected finish put Luton 2-1 up at half-time, after Saul’s equaliser, and dreaming of a major upset over last season’s beaten FA Cup finalists.
But Chelsea’s extra power and nous eventually applied enough of a squeeze to subdue the Hatters as Werner and Lukaku completed the comeback.
