3 Reasons to not be disappointed after Liverpool defeat
3 Reasons to not be disappointed after Liverpool defeat
A belated review!
Certainly I am not happy, but I don’t think any Chelsea fan should be mad after that performance on Sunday.
I realise this is a bit of a belated review, but it’s here all the same!
There are a couple of things that make it not as frustrating of a loss for me.
The Anfield Factor: Every Chelsea fan knows that the bounces, the refs, and every other thing that could go wrong for the opposition at Anfield will go wrong. With that being said, I think Chelsea handled the adversity pretty well. There were no doubt some individual defensive mistakes that led to both goals, but I thought as a whole Chelsea dealt with the dark arts that happen at Anfield pretty well.
Experience vs. Youth: I think in the defining moments of the game you saw a team in Liverpool that has been in these types of games before and utilised that experience to make the key plays required to win the game. I don’t believe that Chelsea will be fretting for more experience in the windows at this point, its clear that their young talent is evolving and it takes high leverage repetitions like this one to get it to the experience level to win this one.
Moises Caicedo & Romeo Lavia: I thought that these two were very impressive in the match and they had a key impact in the 25 minute spell in the first half where Chelsea were truly troubling Liverpool. I think in an ideal world Enzo Maresca would choose both Caicedo and Lavia to start for Chelsea when fit against an opposition that is going to be high tempo in the counter attack. They are our most versatile midfielders and I think would be the ideal pairing for Chelsea moving forward.
Caicedo has really come into his own and is sort of a metronome in a sense in the midfield and is getting more comfortable than ever on the ball in tight positional play. In my opinion, Caicedo not only has regained his form while at Brighton, but taken another step in his game adding into the offensive side of the game and continuing that today with a beautiful assist on Jackson’s goal.
Overall this match wasn’t necessarily the result we wanted, but I would honestly say that the performance probably warranted a draw at least. Chelsea are on a run now of a lot of competitive fixtures in the PL with Newcastle, Manchester United, and Arsenal on the horizon. I would rate Chelsea to have a chance to win all of these matches if they clean up some of the silly mental mistakes.
Dylan
Here here. I thought the performance was good although we possibly didn't test the keeper enough, although difficult to find space given how they were defending. You're correct about the anfield factor, Oliver really should of sent Brooks to the screen for the foul on Sancho, incredibly poor/biased and that was at 0-0 with Palmer stepping up, so 1-0 to us. Changes the entire complexion of the game. I thoroughly look forward to going past both them and City the next couple seasons given the age profile of our rapidly developing squad. Can't see anything other than United getting a bit of a pasting next weekend when we go there and Newcastle should be 3 points this weekend as well.