there was a few ref decisions that was baffling like how he didn't book Havertz for blocking Darlow from taking a kick in the first half and again later raising his foot to block Darlow from taking a kick both denying the resumption of the game, punishable with a yellow card he chose to book Darlow later for timewasting and booked Ritchie for time wasting
Darlow was time wasting from about the 3rd minute. It was getting frustrating the amount of time he was taking to get the ball back in play. Think Havertz was just trying to draw his attention to it. I am with Pouchy though - would prefer to see Dubravka or if not Woodman back in. Darlow's distribution is awful. It was like watching a 70's game of football the number of times he kicked long.
I can't understand why we are not playing Almiron. We need legs in midfield and he has them. He can also beat a man which is essential when we are playing such a defensive line up. Thought Hayden and Longstaff had good first halves but all they were doing was plugging gaps and closing spaces. There was nobody who could fill that space between midfield and attack. It was desperate to watch. Chelsea are a good side but after that very first attack by us we didn't test them at all.
This is what FA coaching badges gets you - to concede less goals, you need 8 defenders. Except, of course, it doesn't work. please log in to view this image
A proper defender would have headed that out for a goal kick rather than back heading it up in the air. Goes without saying that as a defender when you are turned by an attacker who puts in a cross from the byeline that you head it the way you are facing. There are bound to be a line of attackers behind you and all your defenders facing towards goal.
Except it was Ross Barclay, we were 3-0 down at the time and as defenders they did exactly the right thing, not diving in on the edge of the box, stopping him doing anything dangerous and causing him to go back out. There is very little else they could do in that situation. All the errors occurred earlier in the 2nd half and generally higher up the pitch. We give possession away so easily that we just invite pressure back on ourselves. We then funnel back conceding territory and possession and trying to defend on the edge of the box. Its nullifies any attacking talent that we actually have as they have very little meaningful possession. I would immediately replace Manquillo with Murphy and Hayden or Longstaff with Almiron and see if we can't just defend a bit higher up the pitch and try and retain possession a bit better.
I think it was more the fact Chelsea felt we were so awful, they could take the piss like this. He's not trying to go past, he's effectively handing out a lesson of "why the **** did you let me get into the box? Are you that **** at football and defending you thought it'd be a good idea to let me have the ball two yards inside your penalty area?"
So what do you do in that position? It comes down to defending too deep. I guess we could have switched up and suddenly gone to all out attack but would have conceded far more then. They were in that mode a team gets in when they were 3-0 up and it become easy to retain possession. They don't have to move forward any more. They can just hold on to it, play it sideways and back, and make you look stupid. Its the price you pay for setting up defensively and then conceding 3 goals. As a non-professional I would have probably run up to him and raked my studs down his calf after the ball had long gone.
