A CHELSEA performance of consummate patience and no little poise was rewarded 12 minutes from time by Dan Petrescu's first goal of the season. It was no more than his team deserved against stubborn but severely limited opponents for whom life under a new manager is proving problematical. For the Chelsea players, already agog at the prospect of AC Milan's forthcoming visit to Stamford Bridge in the Champions' League, it really was a case of going from the sublime to the crazy with a trip to Selhurst Park. There was no place for Chris Sutton in Gianluca Vialli's team for the second game running, but Didier Deschamps returned after injury to stiffen the Chelsea midfield. For Wimbledon, coming off the back of a 4-0 hammering at Everton, there was a first appearance for the Israeli international Walid Badir, a £1 million close-season capture who was heavily involved from the start. Attacking from a position on the wide right of Wimbledon's four-man midfield, first he set up a half-chance for Robbie Earle with an athletic bicycle kick which Ed De Goey just managed to gather; and moments later the Israeli's charge through the inside-right channel was only halted by a crude challenge from Frank Leboeuf on the edge of the Chelsea area. Sadly for the Dons, Michael Hughes' free kick was driven straight at the wall, while a second free kick from a similar position, again four a Le Leboeuf foul on Badir for which the Frenchman was cautioned, was nodded to safety by Leboeuf himself. Playing Wimbledon can have a strange effect on the best of teams and it took Chelsea a while to find any semblance of rhythm. When they did, it was Deschamps and Wise who provided it with a series of probing passes into danger areas that Wimbledon's defenders struggled to intercept. But for all their finesse, and despite a delightful back heel by Gianfranco Zola into the path of Celestine Babayaro which Tore Pedersen managed to deal with, Chelsea failed to create a clear shooting opportunity in the opening half hour. Instead a mistake by Marcel Desailly presented Hughes with the first real chance but the Irishman's rising snap shot flew fractionally over the bar. Moments later, thanks to another clever touch from Zola, Tore Andre Flo finally found some space in the Wimbledon penalty area but shot straight at Neil Sullivan and Flo again, with a far-post header, and Zola went close to finding a finishing touch as Chelsea ended the half well on top. For all the talk of Egil Olsen's computer-aided tactical designs, it was hard to distinguish Wimbledon under the Norwegian from the team managed by Joe Kinnear. The introduction of Alan Kimble for Pedersen suggested Olsen himself was not entirely happy with his celebrated zonal-marking system. The move nearly backfired 10 minutes after the break when Gustavo Poyet released Babayaro and only a combination of Sullivan's reflexes and Wise's poor finishing frustrated Chelsea. Further left-wing crosses from Deschamps, following a lovely piece of skill to beat Kenny Cunningham, and Wise were also cut out by Sullivan with Zola again threatening to pounce. By now though Wimbledon, with the help of the offside flag and some desperate last-ditch challenges, were hanging on by a thread. It finally snapped when Poyet's square pass found Petrescu, not for the first time completely unmarked and the Rumanian fired unerringly past Sullivan into the far corner.