When Jose Mourinho’s Chelsea are on this kind of form there is no stopping them. They were stylish and ruthless in a devastating opening spell in which they scored twice against opponents West Bromwich Albion on Saturday. The victory came effortlessly.

Mourinho described the performance as “beautiful.” It was difficult to disagree with the Chelsea boss. “The quality of the football was from another dimension,” he added.

His side could have easily added more to the two first-half strikes by Diego Costa and Eden Hazard, but the victory was never in doubt, especially after defender Claudio Yacob was sent off for a two-footed tackle.

For now, at least, Mourinho’s Chelsea sit seven points ahead of their closest rivals at the Premier League summit.

Southampton, their nearest challengers, face Aston Villa tonight, but Chelsea supporters, who haven’t seen their side win the league title since 2010, must be thinking that this could be their year, especially since the challenge from Manchester City is faltering and the likes of Arsenal and Liverpool are nowhere to be seen.

“The quality of our football was high,” said Mourinho, clearly enjoying the moment. “We were playing so well, so fast, so fluid.  We made the pitch very wide. We created spaces to play inside. We scored two goals, we should score much more than that. It was fantastic.”

West Brom offered little resistance to the Chelsea forward line early on and were punished.

With just over a quarter of the match gone, the home side were comfortably ahead through goals from the impressive Costa, who finished well inside the penalty area after collecting a cross from Oscar on his chest before firing it past goalkeeper Ben Foster.

Hazard, who was on typically dazzling form, scored a second after West Brom’s players switched off from a corner kick.

Chelsea should have added more but eased off in the second half as Alan Irvine’s men were left trying to claw a goal back.