Chelsea secured their place in the English FA Cup semi-finals with a comfortable 2-0 victory at Middlesbrough on Saturday.
Boro overcame Manchester United and Tottenham to reach the last eight, but Thomas Tuchel’s Premier League side did not have such difficulties at the Riverside Stadium.
This was in spite of the chaos around the Russian-owned club with a quickfire sale due.
Romelu Lukaku needed just 15 minutes to open the scoring before Hakim Ziyech added a second in the first half.
Boro managed only one shot on target, which came in the 85th minute, in response.
Chelsea will now wait to find out the identity of their semi-final opponents in Sunday’s last-four draw.
The ties are set to take place across April 16 and 17 at Wembley Stadium.
The rest of the round’s fixtures are on Sunday.
Mason Mount’s early cross just escaped the despairing dive of Christian Pulisic at the back post, but Chelsea were ahead shortly after.
A sweeping move out from defence offered space down the right for Mount, who whipped across for Lukaku to tap in.
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Ziyech doubled the lead 16 minutes later when he finished into the bottom-left corner from outside the area following an offload from Mount.
Mount’s second assist of the game took him to 50 goal involvements for Chelsea across all competitions, while Anfernee Dijksteel cleared off the line from Lukaku before the break.
Folarin Balogun wastefully curled over and Duncan Watmore missed the target in similar fashion as Chris Wilder’s side ramped up the intensity early in the second half.
Joe Lumley then denied a flicked Timo Werner header from Mount’s inswinging free-kick and Edouard Mendy turned away from Watmore as Chelsea eased to victory.(dpa/NAN)
