Jase

That's the thing with Kenedy - where would he even fit in? He won't get ahead of Pulisic and CHO and although he can play at LB or even LWB, it's not primary position and we will have other options ahead of him. We also have the LB Ian Maatsen, who Lampard seems to take note of from the academy.

Alonso has played 13 games out of 19 this season and although not all the goals conceded from set pieces are necessarily his fault, the stats don't look great when he's playing compared to when he's not playing. In the 13 games he played, we conceded 9 goals from those situations (5 free kicks/corners; 3 direct free kicks and 1 penalty) - and if you remember, he made our issues in this situation worse in that home game against Ajax. In the 6 games he didn't play, we conceded only 3 goals (1 corner, 2 penalties).

Okay, that seems like an exaggeration for Alonso. Maybe my memory has failed me but I don't recall Palace looking dangerous from set pieces. In fact, we didn't even give away a single corner in that game. And heck, we even won more aerial challenges than Palace did!

Lampard on Azpi... https://www.football.london/chelsea-fc/players/cesar-azpilicueta-chelsea-reece-james-17235170

I honestly don't get the hate for the latter either. Kenedy could certainly be a useful option under Lamps IMO. Don't think people hate Kenedy per se but it's just that he's bang average and at this point, enough of stocking up duds in this squad. Furthermore, where would he even be useful as an option? Pulisic & CHO suddenly seem to be occupying the left wing position and at the moment, we have Alonso & Emerson as the left backs (could well be Chilwell and Emerson going forward).

Which does beg the question, would Lampard sign another experienced player next summer or would he go after Sancho?

I don't think Lampard was singling them out. Was just using Willian as reference point for the younger players. Only the other day he was praising Pulisic for his off the ball work etc.

Lampard wants a new contract for Willian it seems because he's madly in love with him... https://www.football.london/chelsea-fc/players/willian-new-chelsea-contract-lampard-17234369

But on the other hand, if we leave out Kante, it'll send out the message that he's only useful against the big teams. Jorginho & Kovacic are our two midfield passers. We need to carefully manage and rotate them, especially with the amount of games coming up after the international break.

I think our performances in general have been fine (maybe the set up a little too open at times) but our main issue is defensive set pieces. In the 6 games against Man United, Liverpool, Ajax (twice each), we conceded 7 goals (out of 12) from those situations - 5 from free kicks/corners and 2 from penalties.

cc @Tomo

Two attacking sides with not-so-good defences. Oh boy, this could be anything.

We're above Man City going into this and have suffered less league losses than them...

Yeah well, you would still expect them to win certain games. They aren't going to be shit all season.

Meh. United winning at OT over Brighton is kinda expected anyway.

Those 2 goals are the perfect examples of 'going the extra mile' that Lampard was talking about last week.

We all know Favre didn't fancy Pulisic and it also didn't help that he had little, niggling injuries. Hard to build up any sort of form/consistency when you're in and out of the team. He did finish the season strongly once he recovered and was put back into the team.

Ancelotti might become a free manager soon...