The Chels

That was an excellent pass from Ivanovic of all people for our goal (Hazard's wasn't bad either, mind!). Atleti did something similar for two of their goals against us last year and it had all our defenders scrambling. Cross-field ball into the box (to winger/FB) + cut back = nightmare for defenders. We should play that move more often.

Not that I can remember but allowing even one dangerous opportunity in the last few minutes (against that awful Pool side) is one too many. I agree that you can definitely control the game without possession but that tends to entail having a good defensive shape and looking like not conceding. In the last part of the game I remember us giving the ball away in dangerous positions and we were trying but failing to get out of our own half. Lucky that Liverpool were playing so badly and even then we should have conceded a penalty. If that Liverpool game is the only example of a big away game where you could argue that we had control and attacking/defensive balance (at times) then that does highlight my point.

We were definitely not controlled defensively/offensively for the last 10 minutes either. Constantly giving the ball away and allowing the opposition into good shooting opportunities (Gerrard's shot that led to Cahill's handball) doesn't scream good defending to me. So you could argue it was up to 40 minutes of lack of control and balance which is a pretty big proportion of the game. I assume it's in reference to this: http://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/football/news/jose-mourinho-chelsea-would-lose-4734062

I asked for a big away match where we attacked well and defended well... You gave an example and I explained how we didn't defend so well. How is that being picky?

The first half was pretty bad defensively - they cut through our midfield so easily on at least 2 occasions. We were also lucky not to concede a penalty at 2-1 after dropping too deep and constantly giving the ball away so I don't think that game counts lol

Last season perhaps (City away comes to mind but then we tried the exact same tactics in the FA Cup tie and unsurprisingly lost) but in any of the big away games this season? I don't think so and that lack of balance even came into a big home game today which worries me.

Sorry where did I say that Wenger was better than Mourinho? I merely pointed out the fact that Arsenal have won more points against City this season than we have and since you can't argue with that you decided to make up a wild inference. Nice job. If you completely ignore the first half and Henderson's sitter in ET then I guess so

We shouldn't have to resort to attacking well but being defensively all over the shop (i.e. your Arsenal example) or defending well but having no attack. Nobody wants us to go with the former but rather we want to see a good defensive and attacking performance at the same time. With the players we have we should be more than capable of doing that - especially at home, no?

There is a middle ground. Wenger's taken 4/6 points against City this season, 2 more than us, so I don't think he should be used as a bad example here.

Have to agree with this. There does always seem to be a lot of excuses for Jose's big-game tactics when we don't win. Today it's fatigue/injuries and against City away it was 'a point is a good result here, Schurrle's fault we didn't win'. I remember Jose got plenty of praise on here after the Atletico 0-0 away result last season with a lot of attempts at justifying his set-up (e.g. Hazard was injured) even though playing for no away goals would inevitably prove costly. If you take today's game in isolation then the poor performance can be justified but when you look at all our big games together and see that this kind of performance happens often (although usually it tends to be away from home) then I don't buy that there always happens to be convenient excuses.

Agreed. The balance in the big games is still lacking: we seem to only look (relatively) defensively solid when we have no attacking threat, and we only look like creating good chances when we are defensively open. We haven't played with excellent balance and transitions in a big away game this season. That has to change soon if we want to do well in the CL.

It's a bit of a worry how easily City nullified our attacking transitions. Could blame fatigue for this game but they did it at the Etihad too. Must improve if we want to go far in the CL.

A good result in the end but disappointing that we've yet again lost a 1-0 lead. Happens too often.

Eh?

They shouldn't be allowed to get in behind our backline so easily. Very poor.

You haven't noticed? Can't believe we've lost another 1-0 lead in a big game. It's so bloody frustrating.

Has been for ages.

Will we ever park the bus properly this season?

He's injured remember.

Well we shouldn't allow him to be exposed 1v1 so often. It's very poor team defending.

Both excellent players but the difference is that Silva has already peaked.

Ahead of La Liga teams (current CL & EL winners)? Doubt it.

This is the kind of the game where Chelsea's reputation across the football world is defined. Big performance needed.

Bayern still look very vulnerable to the counter attack in the big games. Real and Atletico would easily beat them and I'd fancy our chances too.

That's a fair point but personally I don't think playing Ramires instead of Cesc will reduce our chances of winning this game.