You said we need to have balance between resting and keeping them sharp and you made 10 changes except GK
But it is almost the same quality I do not see much difference except in defense.
I did not do update in a few months:
Alonso starting in the PL:
Games 11 won 10 draw 1 loses 0 Only draw came against Bournemouth 2:2 when he scored twice so not his fault he was let down by others.
Without Alonso:
20 6 5 9
This is with all the games. Even the ones when he came from the bench like Liverpool and Norwich.
Amazing defensive performance! Rudi and Chris were both great! This may surprise some but no defensive issues with Alonso either. He did much better job against Mahrez than Emerson this season.
Even against Villa he was our only defender without big mistakes.
Set pieces are still our big problem and since this is the case we need to stop giving stupid fouls. Kante foul for KDB goal was completely unnecessary. Mahrez was going alone on Rudi and Chris in front of him...
We had 2 or 3 more situations like this.
Offensively we played on counters, this is fine, I like how Frank is flexible in terms of tactics and formation.
He is smart and he knows what needs to be done in the future. He mentioned in January transfer window that we lack creativity and that we need more in the final 3rd and this is true.
Even today all our best chances came from big City mistakes or something else...
Pulisic goal - huge Mendy mistake.
Mount big chance - Ederson mistake.
Second Pulisic chance - long Chris pass and again City defense mistake.
Chance before penalty - Willian solo action (and this happens rarely)
Midfielders did not produce anything.
I mean just look at the stats. No Chelsea player have more than 6 assists this season.
This will change with Ziyech and even Werner. They have 34 assists combined this season.
Bright future ahead!
Oh there were even worse comments... Just look at first 5 pages. Marketing boy, and my favorite: we are paying 60m for Pulisic while we could get Jovic
I was really impressed with him today too.
That is the thing with defenders. They have to play consistently. Frank needs to choose two and continue with them.