The Chelsea FC manager was unhappy with some of the individual performances from his players as his team suffered a second loss this season, on the occasion of Jos Mourinho’s 100th league game in charge at Stamford Bridge.
Defensive problems once again were the downfall of Chelsea FC and Jos Mourinho, this time against Crystal Palace at Stamford Bridge on Saturday. Alan Pardew’s men were excellent throughout the game, committing numbers in attack and defending resolutely to take away all three points.
Of the very few positives, the performance of Brazilian teenager Kenedy stood out in particular, something Mourinho pointed out as a reason for the improvement in the performance of the team in the final stages of the game.
Mourinho unhappy with individual performances
The likes of Branislav Ivanovi and Cesc F bregas have come in for criticism for their poor starts to the season, and following the game against Crystal Palace, Mourinho indicated that he was unhappy with certain individual performances, blaming himself for leaving an unnamed player on for the full 90 minutes.
The Portuguese is quoted by the Chelsea FC official website as saying: “That is the way you work during the week, to perform collectively and to do that you need individual performances. At this level, when opponents are good and well-organised, with good spirit and nothing to lose, you need people to perform. I cannot say I had 11 players performing at the same time.
a Two or three of them were far from good and I blame myself for keeping one of them on for 90 minutes.”
The former Real Madrid manager did, however, have some positive things to say about debutant Kenedy, whose impressive cameo highlighted some of his key strengths: his pace, his ability to drive forward with the ball, and his ferocious shot.
“Cesar Azpilicueta was fantastic but I took him off because I wanted to give more depth to the side and to play without a left-back and with a kid going forward like Kenedy did,” said Mourinho. “He is a good personality and this is what we needed at the time. Kenedy was responsible for an improvement in the team.”
Pardew delighted with his team’s performance
.
Alan Pardew was understandably delighted with his side’s display at Stamford Bridge on Saturday, praising his players and indicating that Mourinho’s men were afraid of the pace in his team. The Chelsea FC defence has long been vulnerable to pace, and a malfunctioning double-pivot of Nemanja Mati and Cesc F bregas has only served to accentuate those defensive vulnerabilities.
Speaking to the BBC, Pardew said (via Reuters): “We can frighten teams with our pace and we did that from start to finish. Our defenders had to defend really well and they did. We’ve added new players this season but haven’t lost our spirit.
“It was a really good performance today, one of the best I’ve seen from one of my teams in terms of composure. We have got technically better players than last season. I’m not saying we’re contenders for Europe but we’re a good side.”
Crystal Palace certainly are that. Although much of the focus will undoubtedly be on Mourinho and his shocking start to the season with Chelsea FC, Pardew and the Eagles deserve immense credit not only for their performance yesterday, but their start to the season in general.
As for Mourinho, the international break probably could not have come at a much better time. It is time to go back to the drawing board to try and fix the issues with what looks to be a broken, bruised Blues side.