Stoke City twice fought back but it was not enough to prevent Chelsea from racking up a record-equalling 4-2 victory at Stamford Bridge on Saturday afternoon.
The Blues were pushed hard by their opponents, who hit back through Bruno Martins Indi and Peter Crouch goals in the second half, but they did enough to make it a perfect 13 wins on the spin.
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Willian scored twice, either side of goals from Gary Cahill and Diego Costa, to put Chelsea level with Preston North End, Sunderland and, most recently, Arsenal for successive games won in a single season.
It was certainly not easy for the hosts and Stoke looked the more composed of the two teams in the opening quarter of the match, getting right at their opponents despite the prospect of a repeat of the 4-1 thrashing at the hands of Liverpool earlier this week.
A couple of wayward Blues shots aside, neither team could really find any space to manoeuvre in the final third in their near-identical systems.
Chelsea finally showed some signs of stepping things up a gear or two 20 minutes in when Costa took down a 70-yard David Luiz pass with his chest, brought it under control with his thigh and then volleyed on goal for Lee Grant to make his first stop of the afternoon.
There was a sign of things to come for Stoke soon after as Cahill headed on target from a corner unmarked inside the box, which he would replicate 34 minutes in from the other side to kickstart the high-scoring affair in West London.
Eden Hazard and Costa were both denied by Grant in the build-up to that Cahill breakthrough, but Stoke had come close themselves through Charlie Adam's header up the other end and were clearly unperturbed as the first half transpired.
The Potters, without a win in four heading into this clash, failed to test Thibaut Courtois on a single occasion, however, and could hardly complain about being a goal down at the midway point.
It took the visitors just 55 seconds of the second half to level things up, though, with Martins Indi sweeping home a Crouch knockdown to score from his side's first attempt on target all match.
That was just the third goal the Blues had conceded during their winning run, denying them an 11th clean sheet in that time, but they responded well and came close to a second through Willian and Costa attempts.
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Willian then restored Chelsea's lead just short of the hour mark following a well-worked team move, culminating in Moses picking out Hazard to deftly lay the ball off for the Brazilian to rifle past Grant's reach.
There was a chance for Costa to add a second from close range soon after only to sweep wide, and that almost proved costly when Stoke levelled up the contest for a second time.
In a near replica of Chelsea's second, substitute Bojan Krkic found Mame Biram Diouf in some space inside the box, with the Senegalese feeding it through to Crouch to score his first goal in 22 games.
Chelsea were given a chance to show just why they are such strong favourites for the title, which they justified in style by hitting back 75 seconds later through Willian's sweeping finish after being played in by Cesc Fabregas.
Crouch gave the ball straight to Willian with 15 minutes of the game remaining, starting a home counter than ended with Hazard playing in Costa to lift the ball over the City bar.
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Antonio Conte's men have led by just a single goal in the closing stages in plenty of games of late, yet this had a different feel about it and it could have been 3-3 if not for a vital Cesar Azpilicueta interception to thwart Crouch.
There was to be no late twist, though, as Costa outmuscled Martins Indi and blasted the ball through Grant from nowhere to make it seven home wins in succession for Chelsea and 13 overall - now just one away from equalling Arsenal's other record of 14 straight wins, coming across two separate seasons.
Daniel Lewis
