Pizy

I'm hyped for this! Expecting a significantly better performance than last weekend and all 3 points. Hopefully my hype won't be deflated the second our XI is announced.

Meh. Gabriel Jesus is nothing that special to me at this moment. Obviously he's very young and will probably develop into a special player but for now he's benefitting massively from the service he gets from brilliant teammates. It seems like 99% of his goals are easy tap ins. It's a skill to always be in the right place at the right time but he's not scoring worldies or anything. As far as technical ability goes, Willian, Pedro, Hazard, Cesc are all excellent technically yet still we struggle against the press. Kante and Baka are tanks and they struggle against it. Think it comes down to training and philosophy rather than the quality of players. Pep probably has his players working endlessly on this stuff and it shows.

The only thing that really makes me jealous about City is the fact that every single player in their XI is not only good on the ball but also extremely comfortable when being pressed. That's the biggest difference I see between them and us. Their attacking players can either resist the press with great close control or by playing a one touch pass. They're so much better than us in that regard that's it's depressing. When you look on an individual player basis I wouldn't say they're miles and miles better than ours. The likes of Sané, Sterling, Jesus, Fernandinho, etc are all good players I wouldn't consider any of them top class. Their tactics from Pep and their system is just outstanding. They only really have Silva and KDB (+ Aguero when he actually plays) who are truly world class. And just think about that...they can blow away the in form side in Europe without the their talismanic, world class striker. Bernardo Silva, Gündogan and Yaya can't even get in the side. We lose our striker and get outplayed by Palace and look terrible. This sort of progress from year 1 under Guardiola to year 2 is what should've happened with us and Conte. Unfortunately, their ownership and board made massively ambitious moves in the transfer window whilst ours were content to tread water. What's scarier is that City still want Sanchez and who knows who else.

Trying to think of a club in the CL that can really give City problems. Think it'll have to be a team that can out Pep, Pep and keep the ball from them. Barca or PSG, maybe. In this form they may be favorites.

I think in this form he's currently the best midfielder in the world. Sensational player. Imagine him in our team. Oh, what could've been. 😔

City are just absolutely ridiculous going forward and in possession. It's astounding that we finished ahead of them last season and they've gone and surpassed us this much, this quickly.

Judging by what I read on Twitter, Conte made it sound like Morata is fully fit so that's good. Said that he could've been risked for Palace but chose not to so he could be ready for this one. Hopefully he doesn't pull up lame early into this one and isn't being rushed back.

Definitely think one of Rüdiger or Christensen will start in place of Cahill. Midfield is where it'll be most interesting. And surely Pedro has to start over Willian because he's much more likely to score.

So, what sort of football do Roma play? Haven't watched them in a while. Possession based, counter attacking, do they like to press? I'll feel pretty confident if we are the side with more of he ball. Especially if Morata is back and fit.

He's currently a good poacher from inside the box but that's about it. He needs a good season long loan at a decent sized club to develop his all around game. The drop off in quality between our strikers is too big for a club like this. City have two strikers in Jesus and Aguero who will each probably score 20 and United have Lukaku and soon Zlatan who can do the same. If Morata goes out for a lengthy period we're fucked. Yet another failure by the board this past summer.

After the right side of our attack, Alonso is probably the most concerning area of our team. He's so painfully slow that he's a liability both attacking and defending. He can very rarely beat his man 1 on 1 because it's so easy for his marker to stay in front of him and he gets easily run past by any decent wide attacking player. We may be able to mask his weaknesses against most sides, but against any of the top sides he'll be ruthlessly targeted and exposed. Seen it time and time again already this season, yesterday included against a terrible side. The worrying this is that we have no real alternative. Kenedy is not Chelsea quality. It was absolute madness to enter the season without cover.

Honestly, I expect a great performance against Roma and then we'll come home and struggle against Watford.

Would it shock you if Watford did beat us, though? I wouldn't be.

Now that I've had a few hours to calm down and think after that shambles today I've calmed down. Guess I was still holding out hope that we'd be competing for the title again. Really thought after that Atleti performance we'd go from strength to strength and fight until the end for the title. Think the league is gone already (which is fucking embarrassing) and the season now is all about top 4 and some good cup runs. We can't win it every year so I guess I'm fine with adjusting my expectations. We really just have get our act together against these small teams that we should be dominating like the Manchester clubs are doing. It seems like our players go into this type of game and think their talent alone will be enough. The small teams come in a make up for their lack of talent with huge effort and fight and bully us. Chelsea shouldn't lose to these teams unless we get out-hustled and out worked like we did today. Our next 2 PL opponents will try to do the same things as Palace did.

Cesc and Baka were both good individually but as a partnership in a midfield 2 it can't work. Without Kante buzzing around dominating our defense was completely exposed. If we don't control and win the midfield battle we stand no chance. Even against minnows like Palace. Getting Drinkwater fit and in the team would be a godsend at this point.

Another thing to think about and feel terrible: that was Zaha's first game back after months injured and he utterly destroyed all three of Luiz, Azpi, and Cahill. These have been some of the best defenders in the league and he made them look like a lower division back 3. Honesly, we should try to buy him in January as an upgrade on Willian and Pedro. That sort of pace and skill is what is most effective in the PL.

Willian, Alonso, Batshuayi, Pedro, Moses, Cahill. We just have so many players who are good once every few games, if that. When you combine the average skill our players posses with utterly shit mentality this is what you get.

Their talent, attitude of the players, and tactical set up are on another planet to ours. They are sent out to dominate anyone in front of them and have world class ability in nearly every position. They go against any opponent and look to impose themselves. We simply do not have the personnel. City are a club with huge ambition. Roman and Chelsea win things and then become complacent. That complacency killed us a couple of years ago and it is killing us again this season. We have 2-4 star players in our entire squad. Two of them were injured today and we completely fell apart.

That was the most disgraceful and embarrassing performance I can remember. Worse than the start we had last season. I predicted we'd struggle here but couldn't have imagined we'd not only look fucking terrible ourselves, but also make the worst side in the league look miles better than us. Our players should be ashamed. Every single one of them. And we can't even use the break as an excuse. City just put 7 past Stoke. They're now miles and miles better than us after we finished miles ahead of them just a few of months ago. If we're very lucky well finish 4th this season. I barely have any desire to even watch us at this point that was so embarrassing.

Alonso looks like an amateur player on the ball. Fucking hell. Touch like an elephant.

Zaha ripping us to shreds. This is what you'd expect Hazard to be doing against them. Why can't he!? Hasn't been in the game at all. We're making him look like the best player in the world, ffs!

Look at this! Crystal fucking Palace can ping the ball and and pass it better than the Champions! What. The. Fuck.

Batshuayi is just totally useless everywhere but in the box and when someone plays a perfect cross or pass into him to finish. Hold up play and touch are like Lukaku from years ago. Willian is the opposite. He's fine running with the ball everywhere else but around the box when it matters. Makes me just wanna pull my hair out watching us most of the time. How do we go from that dominant, entertaining Atleti game to the City result and this game? Infuriating.

If we don't get at least a point here, yes. Without Kante to shield the defense we look like frauds. And without Morata up top we look like a midtable side going forward.

Batshuayi and Willian are embarrassing the Chelsea shirt. We will seriously struggle to finish 4th this season. We don't have the quality. When City and United play poorly their worst level is much better than our worst level so they can still get results. Our worst level is this. Getting outplayed by a side who have been a disgrace this season. Our entire defense is scared shitless by anyone running at them like Zaha has done. How the actual fuck can we look this poor?! Outplayed by the worst side in the PL.