AC Milan 1 Chelsea 1

A second half of Milan domination was ended in the 75th minute when Chelsea captain Dennis Wise hit an excellent equaliser to level the scores at the San Siro.

The Londoners only trailed for two minutes after a powerful Oliver Bierhoff header had found the target in the 73rd minute.

That was the cue for Chelsea to raid up the field and substitute Roberto Di Matteo to split the Milan defence with a through pass to Wise whose controlling touch sent him wide of a despairing Abbiati in the Milan goal to turn back on his run and hit the ball into the corner of the net.

The heavy defeat handed out to Hertha Berlin by Galatasary means that Milan can go through if they win in Turkey and Chelsea will only need a draw to qualify with them from Group H.

Chelsea came close to a break through in the 6th minute when Flo and Wise combined to send Romanian international Dan Petrescu in on goal but his cross shot was saved by the legs of goalkeeper Abbiati.

A minute later Flo also had a pop but his low drive went wide of the target and Andriy Shevchenko responded to the early pressure from the London club by smashing in a free kick just wide in the 20th minute and heading a free kick onto the outside of a post in the 25th minute when Chelsea left him with the diminutive Albert Ferrer as his marker.

Chelsea's best chance of the half had arrived a minute earlier when a low cross from Wise was spooned over the bar from close range by Flo who lost his footing just as he reached the ball.

Ferrer was encouraged to ruin forward by a lack of challenges down the right flank in the 27th minute and Abbiati had to extend himself to tip over a powerful shot from the Catalan that was heading for the far corner and Leonardo hit a shot just wide in the 33rd minute from the edge of the penalty area.

Leonardo was booked for the third time in this phase of the tournament and will miss the trip to Galatasary next week with a suspension. Milan replaced the Brazilian with Croatian captain Zvonimir Boban shortly afterwards.