WATCH: Gary Cahill Sent Off For Terrible Challenge On Steven Defour

Antonio Conte was already missing several key players ahead of Chelsea's opening Premier League game, against Burnley, today and within 14 minutes the Blues boss had lost another, with captain Gary Cahill receiving a straight red card for a clumsy foul on Clarets midfielder Steven Defour.

Eden Hazard, Pedro, Victor Moses and new signing Tiemoue Bakayoko were all unavailable for the Premier League champions this afternoon, with Diego Costa also missing as his future at Stamford Bridge hangs in the balance.

Then, just 14 minutes into the opening game of the season, new captain Gary Cahill, who has inherited the armband from John Terry, arrived late with his studs up on Belgian midfielder Defour and immediately knew what the result would be. A straight red card.

Credit: Premier League

Cahill had no arguments as he was given his marching orders and, to make matters worse for the champions, Sam Vokes gave Burnley the lead just minutes later.

The Chelsea captain's dismissal also meant that youngster Jeremie Boga, making his Premier League debut for the Blues, was substituted to make way for Andreas Christensen, which didn't go down well with Chelsea fans.

Oh dear, Gary.

Topics: Chelsea, Football, Gary Cahill, Burnley

Joe Baiamonte

Northerner. Assistant Editor of SPORTbible. Studied Journalism and Broadcasting in a portakabin on a car park of Salford University for three years. Believes football peaked with Serie A in the '90s and strong-arms pro wrestling references into as many articles as possible. Neymar once took 50 euros off me during a game of poker.

@JoeBaia