A 'Disgraceful', 'Embarrassing' Exit

Jose Mourinho proclaimed pre-match that a failure to overcome 'little' Bradford City would be "a disgrace". Well, come Saturday evening, the Portuguese maestro was true to his word as he confirmed that the 2-4 home reverse was indeed a "disgrace." While the media have not surprisingly hyped up Bradford's astonishing comeback as the mother of all FA Cup shocks, it is probably best to label this epic giant-killing occasion as a freak result. 

I am not trying to excuse away Chelsea's ineptitude at failing to hold on to a 2-0 or 2-1 lead, nor am I trying to devalue Bradford's obvious heroics. Far from it. The truth is that Bradford's performance was freakishly good. If they repeated such efforts more regularly, they would be in the Premiership, instead of merely languishing in English football's third tier. Bradford may never hit such heights again, which reaffirms my point that their end product on Saturday past was freakishly good. Were Chelsea freakishly bad? It's not easy to assess such a Chelsea humiliation without stooping to predictable knee-jerk reactions, but I shall try and keep a calm head about the awful proceedings.

First of all, to lose at home to a team from the third division of English football is totally unacceptable, but like I said, it was a freak result. Can Chelsea's attackers be blamed? Well, if we score twice, then it is hard to blame our goal-scoring attempts. Admittedly Chelsea failed miserably again when they were chasing a game in the latter stages. Zouma blazed over when he should have hit the target. This moment of inaccuracy is indicative of a team that always seems to lack composure in front of goal when we are chasing a late equaliser or winner. We really do need to swallow our pride and watch some video performances of ManUre, Arsenil, and Manchester Mercenaries. In fact, the debacle was crying out for super Frank Lampard to provide his customary cool finish and rescue the Blues. In fact he nearly did so again at home to Middlesbrough, but his own illustrious FA Cup career ended on a sour, giant-killing note too.

No, Chelsea's woes can be blamed almost entirely on the fact that we were largely overrun in the second half, and allied to that, we were clearly incapable of keeping the West Yorkshire hordes at bay. I believe that the word is defending - something that was conspicuously absent on Saturday afternoon. It is very easy to blame the much-maligned Obi Mikel for the rout, but in fact when he was replaced after seventy minutes, Chelsea still led two-one. Peculiarly, Fabregas and Willian, drafted in to bring security to the proceedings, both presided over a three-nil defeat in the last 25 minutes or so! Even the elusive Hazard failed to work his magic, in spite of producing his customary trickery. Bradford City were simply not to be denied. So what did we learn of Chelsea's bad day at the office?

Well, it seems no coincidence but for two of Chelsea's three defeats this winter, Nemanja Matic was absent. It is abundantly clear that when we take big Matic out of the equation, suddenly Chelsea are not quite the unstoppable force that they often are. Chelsea without the giant Serb are plainly not the same team. Mikel is a poor stand-in. That is an open secret. Secondly, what seems most alarming is that not only is there an apparent gulf in class between Chelsea's first team and much of the rest of the Premiership, but there is a noticeable difference between the quality of Chelsea's first eleven and the second string. Mourinho was scathing of his reserve players after Chelsea staggered past Shrewsbury in the Capital One Cup, suggesting that few had demonstrated themselves worthy of promotion to the top table any time soon. Again on shock Saturday, the fringe players reminded us all painfully as to why they are perpetual bench-warmers and can expect to remain so for the foreseeable future. JM even went so far as to state on Monday that the reason he keeps fielding the same eleven or twelve players each week is that he has little faith in their reinforcements, and now he has our complete sympathy.

If Chelsea's reserve players are not up to scratch, and the evidence appears to be compelling, then questions must be raised about Chelsea's shuffling of the pack last summer. Did we send the wrong players out on loan? Would Kalas not have shored up our defensive unit and given Cahill a much-needed rest? Would Van Ginkel not have been a better bet than Mikel? Would Moses or Bamford, or even Bertrand not have added value to the team? One thing is for sure. The management will have identified one or two duds who are heading inexorably towards life away from the Bridge. I certainly don't want to kick a man when he is down, but Salah is obviously under intense scrutiny at present. However, I did warn in January of last year when he was purchased that Chelsea Football Club had a questionable policy of regularly recruiting players who had previously performed well against us [such as Fleck and Torres] and that this nonsense strategy represented extremely lazy scouting. The words "I told you so" spring to mind.  

Now that the post-mortem has almost run its course and the Chelsea-haters far and wide have finally ended their fit of laughter, the west Londoners must brace themselves for the more considerable challenge of Liverpoo on Tuesday evening. I expect to see a different Chelsea, with the returning Costa, Ivanovic, and Terry all reminding us why they are indispensable. The second leg however is very much up in the air, and I think that we should delude ourselves about the value of the away goal. I wouldn't be surprised if Liverfools score at least once. We shall just have to score more than they do. It sounds easy, but it ain't. The occasion calls for some attacking football, but the clever, 'genius' of Mourinho is usually so terrified at conceding a goal that his team play with too much fear of the opposition. Let's lick them Liverpoor folk and no pussyfooting about with an exhibition of patient soccer. Urgency is called for. We could learn a thing or two from Bradford. Maybe Mourinho will dip his toes into the January transfer window and swap our replacements for their first team.

CHELSEA 2 Bradford City 4; half time: 2-1. Saturday 24th January 2015.

CHELSEA goal scorers: Cahill; Ramires

CHELSEA team: Cech, Christiansen, Cahill, Zouma, Azpilicueta, Mikel, Ramires, Oscar, Salah, Drogba, Remy. Used substitutes: Fabregas, Willian, Hazard.

CHELSEA LEADING SCORERS:

Costa - 17 goals

Hazard - 12 goals

Oscar - 7 goals

Drogba - 6 goals

Schurrle and Terry - 5 goals

Fabregas and Remy - 4 goals

Matic, Ramires, and Willian - 3 goals

Cahill, Ivanovic, and Zouma - 2 goals