Chelsea demolished Bournemouth 5-1 to cruise past a side fighting relegation. It was a demolition job that barely left room for debate. Henderson opened the scoring after just two minutes with a clinical finish from Palmer's assist, then Rogers made it two a minute later, also from Henderson's setup. The pattern was clear early: Bournemouth were chasing shadows. João Pedro added a third after the break, converting from Neto's pass, before Evanilson grabbed a consolation for the visitors in the 51st minute—a rare bright spot in an otherwise bleak afternoon. Pedro grabbed his second and Chelsea's fourth seven minutes later, courtesy of Chavarria's assist, and Henderson rounded things off with a fifth on 70 minutes to put the result well beyond doubt.

Our model predicted a 2-1 Chelsea win and leaned towards them taking it, though the 45% win probability reflected genuine uncertainty—the draw at 30% and Bournemouth upset at 25% both looked plausible on the numbers beforehand. We got the direction right but badly underestimated Chelsea's margin. The pre-match view flagged Chelsea's strong home form against Bournemouth's poor away record and the historical edge in their head-to-head, but the actual scoreline belonged to a different scale entirely. Where we'd weighted a tight contest, Chelsea simply overpowered their visitors from kickoff.

The gap between forecast and reality here hinges on execution and intensity rather than structural factors. Chelsea's attacking quality and clinical finishing—three goals in the opening three minutes set a tone the model didn't anticipate—turned what looked like a live match into a rout. Bournemouth never got a foothold, and whatever defensive grit their relegation scrap might have offered didn't materialise. Sometimes a team's talent just shows up and plays a perfect first half, and that's what happened here.