Armando Broja gives dad perfect gift with ‘amazing’ first Chelsea goal

The wait was less than a minute but for Armando Broja it must have felt like hours. He had just scored his first goal for Chelsea, in the process sealing a much-deserved 3-0 victory against Wolves, when it flashed up on the screens at either side of the pitch at Stamford Bridge that VAR was checking for offside. Cue boos from the majority of those in attendance and a growing sense the strike was going to be ruled out. But soon came confirmation that it stood. The boos turned into cheers and for Broja there was an opportunity to once again celebrate.

He was not the only member of his family to do so. In the stands his parents were also overjoyed, with their son’s breakthrough moment at the weekend particularly special for one of them. “Today is my dad’s [48th] birthday,” Broja said afterwards. “It was a really good gift for him.”

Of that there is no doubt and few could blame Xhevahir Broja if all he spoke to colleagues and customers about upon returning this week to his job as a swimming pool installer was “Armando’s goal”. There will be pride not only in its quality and staging but also in the patience and dedication shown by his boy so he could find himself in that position in the first place.

For sure it has been a long time coming, with Broja joining Chelsea’s academy at the age of eight and working his way through various youth levels before finally getting the chance, aged 18, to make his first-team debut in a 4-0 win against Everton in March 2020.

His progressed then stalled, in large part because of Covid, and it required two season-long loan spells, with Vitesse Arnhem and Southampton, before he was able to play again for Chelsea at senior level. That has come this season, with Broja regularly deployed as a