Napoli has it easy against Chelsea

Ezequiel Lavezzi (L) and Edinson Cavani (C) dampened the English hopes by leading Napoli to a 3-1 win over Chelsea in the Champions League last 16 match-up.

Chelsea's Champions League hopes are in the balance following a 3-1 loss to Napoli in the first leg of their last-16 tie on Tuesday, after Real Madrid was pegged back by a 93rd-minute equaliser at CSKA Moscow.

Chelsea took the lead through Juan Mata at Napoli's Stadio San Paolo but a brace from the excellent Ezequiel Lavezzi and another goal from Edinson Cavani turned the tie in the Italian side's favour ahead of the second leg on March 14.

Coupled with Arsenal's 4-0 loss at AC Milan and early exits for Manchester United and Manchester City, Chelsea's defeat raises the prospect of the quarterfinals being devoid of English teams for the first time since 1996.

It was the visitors who struck first, however, as Mata capitalised on Paolo Cannavaro's miscued clearance to place a cool volley past Morgan De Sanctis in the 27th minute.

Two quick goals

The Londoners could not hold out until half-time though, and two quick-fire goals put Napoli ahead.

Lavezzi equalised in the 38th minute by bending a low shot around Cech from the edge of the box and in first-half injury time, Cavani stole in front of Branislav Ivanovic to divert Gokhan Inler's cross into the roof of the net with his shoulder.

Lavezzi dragged wide when well placed in the 55th minute but he made amends 10 minutes later, tucking the ball into an unguarded goal after Cavani had blocked David Luiz's weak attempted clearance.

CSKA was playing its first competitive game since the group stage closed in December, but it started in enterprising fashion with Alan Dzagoev volleying wide from Georgi Schennikov's left-wing cross.

Ronaldo strikes

Mourinho's side, 10 points clear in La Liga, lost Karim Benzema to injury after a quarter of an hour, but in the 28th minute the nine-time champion struck.

Fabio Coentrao's left-wing cross was allowed to reach the back post and Cristiano Ronaldo pounced to drill a left-footed strike past Sergei Chepchugov for his fourth goal in this season's competition.

Ronaldo twice threatened to claim a second goal but CSKA survived and in the third minute of injury time punished its opponent when Wernbloom met Aleksei Berezutski's knock-down with a right-foot volley that flashed past Iker Casillas.

The results:

At Moscow: CSKA Moscow 1 (Wernbloom 90+3) drew with Real Madrid 1 (Ronaldo 28).

At Naples: Napoli 3 (Lavezzi 38, 65, Cavani 45+2) bt Chelsea 1 (Mata 27).