Frank Lampard scored his 200th goal for the Blues as the west Londoners put one over their East End rivals West Ham at Stamford Bridge this afternoon.
Lampard's goal, in the first half means the goal-scoring midfield machine is now just two away from equalling the club record set by Bobby Tambling.
The three points were sealed give minutes into the second half from the left boot of mercurially talented Eden Hazard.
Chelsea had a hatful of chances to blow the Hammers away, mealy from the bot of Demba Ba, but the Senegal striker had just one of those days when nothing would go right.
He was not needed to produce the goods as the rest of the side did more than enough to ensure three points and a leapfrog over Spurs into third place with a game in hand.
The first effort of net came from the book of West Ham's Ricardo Vaz Te, whose 30-yard free kick would have kept sailing high and away if it didn't stop in row z of the Matthew Harding Stand.
Chelsea countered with a fine attack on four minutes which, after a 10-man passing move found Juan Mata, who clipped the ball over the West Ham rearguard but Bemba Ba was unable to bring the pass under control.
Ba then fluffed a golden opportunity a minute later when, again he beat the visitors' offside trap, and raced unchallenged onto a perfect Frank Lampard pass to find himself one-on-one with Jussi Jaaskelainen, But the Senegal striker sliced the ball wide of the goalkeeper and sadly for him the goal also.
A glancing backwards header by James Collins almost gave given the home side a breakthrough on 13 minutes. But Jaaskelainen snuffed out the misdirected effort.
However the Blues broke the deadlock on 18 minutes when Lampard rose to Eden
Hazard right wing crosshead home high and wide of the goalkeeper' desperate dive to his left, but to a avail.
That was Lampard's 200th Chelsea goal which now leaves him just two goals behind Blues' all-time goalscorer Bobby Tambling.
An unfortunate sideshow at this point was the celebration of John Terry, who, as a substitute was warming up in front of the West Ham fans. After being on the receiving end of some verbal abuse from them, once Lampard had scored Terry raced back to the fans throwing out his chest in triumphant.
Terry then appeared to snub fourth official Howard Webb who had gone halfway down the touch line to speak to the Chelsea skipper.
The Hammers thought they had equalised two minutes later, but after Andy Carroll chested down and slotted home past Petr Cech from right yards out, referee Michael Oliver, pointed for a Chelsea free-kick, presumably indicating that Carroll had fouled Luiz in the attempt.
Hazard and Victor Moses could have doubled the lead, with Moses effort in particular, on 36 minutes creeping inches wide of the West Ham right post.
This was followed by a scintillating counterattack by the Blues on 38 minutes which ended with Mata's left footed curler going even closer by still not close enough.
An acrobatic left footed volley from Luiz a minutes later which many Chelsea fans tough had gone in, served only to illustrate the home side's dominance.
Jaaskelainen was alert to thwart Ba with five minutes of the half to go. The Finland goalkeeper poked his left leg out to deflect's way from goal Ba shot.
The striker could have had four goals n this half when once again he one himself clear on goal. This time he got closer to the goal but the shot, on target, was not strong enough to beat the goalkeeper.
A stinging long range effort from Gary O'Neil easily stopped by Cech was the last action of the half.
West Ham boss Sam Allardyce made the only change at half time, bringing on Matthew Taylor for Mohamed Diame. But it was the Blues who capitalised.
Within four minutes of the restart, Chelsea were two goals up.
On the right, Mozes, Mata and Hazard played a delightful set of one-touch passing be
Tween the three.
Hazard broke ranks and darted for goal, and received the ball in the right apex of the West Ham penalty area from Mata.
The Belgium midfielder skipped past two Hammers defenders before letting fly with a powerful left foot that zipped past Jaaskelainen and into the right hand corner of his net.
While Chelsea remanded dominate, they were always susceptible to the quick break and West Ham delivered one on 55 minutes which Carroll chested the ball down and raced clear. He lacked the pace to go too far so decided to shoot from 25 yards out. His left footed daisy-cutter was at least on target, but not powerful enough to trouble Cech.
James Collins was dispensed with by Allardyce for James Tomkins on 61 minutes.
A poked shot by O'Neil with 20 minutes to go punctuated a period of play where neither side seemed to inclined to try and score.
Sensing that the Blues were perhaps losing their way a bit, interim manager Rafael
Benitez replaced Moses with Oscar a minute later to inject extra momentum into their play.
Skipper John Terry replaced a limping Luiz with 12 minutes of the game to go.
Ex Blue Carlton Cole saw eight minutes of action replacing a ineffectual Ricardo Vaz Te.
Cole was straight into the thick of the action and his volley from a Matthew Jarvis cross forced Cech into a near post save.
In an attempt to stifle Hammers' dominance, Benitez took off Mata for defensive-minded Mikel with five minutes of the clock.
Lampard conspired to thrash a half volley over the visitors' crossbar as the final minutes ebbed to and fro.
But there were no more goals and the majority of the 41,619 crowd went home happy.
Teams:
Chelsea - Cech, Azpilicueta, Cahill, David Luiz, Cole, Ramires, Lampard, Moses, Mata, Hazard, Ba.
Subs: Turnbull, Ivanovic, JT, Bertrand, Mikel, Oscar, Torres.
West Ham United - Demel, Reid (c), Collins, O'Brien, O'Neil, Diame, Collison, Jarvis, Vaz Te, Carroll
Subs: Spiegel, McCartney, Pogatetz, Tomkins, Taylor, C.Cole, Chamakh
Referee - Michal Oliver