Chelsea faced an inferior opponent playing a deep and narrow defense. Chelsea dominated possession and created several decent chances. Chelsea fans spent most of the game scratching their heads and trying to figure out how their team weren't up by several goals. All in all, this was a pretty typical Chelsea games during the post-Didier Drogba era.
After results midweek put Chelsea in a situation where they controlled their own fate in the tile race, yet another loss against a bottom half side should end their title chase. Just like that, Jose Mourinho is no longer unbeaten at Stamford Bridge in the Premier League. Here's hoping we win the Champions League, and troll Liverpool fans everywhere by beating the snot out of them next weekend, as that will make this loss a bit easier to swallow.
Thoughts:
- I really like having Samuel Eto'o around. Keeping him here with Romelu Lukaku and Diego Costa would be fine by me.
- Connor Wickham's rebound goal never should have happened. There was just no excuse to leave a rebound there after Marco Alonso's shot. If Mark Schwarzer couldn't control that effort, he needed to push that wide.
- Our throw-ins are just awful. We've got to be the least dangerous team in the Premier League in that regard.
- I'm not sure how Ramires getting run over by Seb Larsson while attempting to head the ball into an empty net wasn't given for a penalty. Frankly, that was probably a denial of a clear goal scoring opportunity as well.
- Speaking of Ramires, he was very lucky to remain on the pitch just minutes after being denied a penalty. Why the hell would he take a swing at an opposition player at all, let alone right in front of the referee? Luckily for Chelsea, Mike Dean forgot his whistle today. I think we'll be looking at a suspension for that, and likely one that stretches into the start of next season.
- If you didn't see the game and just glanced at the number of shots on target, you'd probably assume Chelsea were a bit unlucky not to have scored more. Unfortunately, most of those shots went straight to the keeper.
- We need to be much better than this on Tuesday.
- Congratulations to Gus Poyet and The Roker Report, who will hopefully manage to use this week's results to avoid being relegated.