Chelsea Match in Review

This blog post is going to be for all the Chelsea fans out there. For any of you that are offended by what I'm saying, you have to remember that this is just my honest opinion of the game on saturday and how I thought things turned out. 

When I heard about Jose's line up for the game there were a couple things that I picked up on. I was pleased that Jose selected Cahill to play next to JT as I believe they work well together and understand each others games better than any other combination, but I was disappointed and frustrated that Juan Mata was left out of the squad. It's confusing as to why one of the worlds top players would be left out of any club squad for a league match. Finally, I couldn't understand why Eto'o started again ahead of Fernando Torres! We have heard Jose talk of Eto'o being rusty after playing a lower level of football in Russia so why select him again?

There were two positives and a negative that I found throughout the game: 

The first positive is the three points! It's safe to say that every single one of us would have taken three points no matter how they came ahead of the game if we were offered them. It's what is written down on record in the Premier League that counts this morning and Chelsea took an all important three points, scoring two goals against their local rivals Fulham.

Now the negatives and where do I begin? I'll start by talking about our first half performance. We have all watched our performances against United, Everton and Basel and despite the first half at Goodison and the chances we created, the second half there and in the 90 minutes of the other two games produced very little goal scoring opportunities. This was based on the tempo of our play and we played the first half exactly the same yesterday. When teams set themselves up against us, it's obvious that they are going to pack the midfield, be disciplined without the ball and look to take away any space for Chelsea to work in their own half. As a result, Chelsea dominate possession of the ball and do nothing with it! We have plenty of the ball but have no penetration. As we look up to pick a pass, there is very little option to try and create space and we end up playing the ball side to side or backwards! As soon as this happens, the tempo of our play slows right down and we play right into the other teams hands!

Now for the second positive! Our second half performance won us the game and was better. What I had been looking for from the start, finally happened in the second half. We played and moved the ball quicker and started to find gaps in the Fulham defense. As a result, they sat deeper, their mid fielders struggled to get involved in the game in attacking areas and found themselves on the back foot and Chelsea started to create better chances! It frustrates the life out of me as to why it took us 45 minutes to get going yesterday! We all saw the difference when they did, it was the exciting style of play we know Chelsea have in them. When we play at pace, teams struggle to cope with our movement and our tempo.

So, after all this, Chelsea sit top of the league ahead of the Premier League games today and we have put ourselves in an important position with the Manchester derby taking place later. Without question, Chelsea are a work in progress and the Juan Mata debate still rumbles on. We have a trip to Swindon coming up on Tuesday ahead of a difficult trip to White Hart Lane on Saturday and we need to work hard if we are to take another three points next week!