Closed Reading 2-2 Chelsea

[The only place to be 11,313]

We already had Bertrand on the other wing. Were we going to play with 6 defenders up 2-0 against Reading in the 85th minute? What other option was there? Marin? Benayoun is much better defensively than Marin. He's better defensively than Mata for that matter. Often, replacing like for like is a good tactic as it gets in fresh legs. Also, they could have scored a third goal to put the game out of reach. The Ba substitution also made sense as it wasted a little time and brought on a player who could maybe run with the ball and hold it up. You look at ManU today, up 2-1 with only one substitution to go, what did SAF do? He brought on Nani for Kagawa. Good teams that are leading might bring on a more defensively-minded midfielder for an attacking one or a defender who is less adventurous, but mostly the subs are mostly about getting fresh legs. The one quibble I would have is not bringing on Terry but...Terry hasn't looked himself yet and is still finding form after a long-term injury so even that is somewhat understandable.

And 5 minutes before that, they bought on Rafael for Anderson and (I'm assuming because I haven't watched the game yet) moved Jones into midfield.

Benitez didn't put out his strongest team to start the game and he didn't act quick enough at the end. He said it himself. He said that they didn't have enough time to bring on Terry which actually sounds like bollocks, and is most likely a case of him trying to cover his enormous, fat arse.

[Bluedoraemon 2]

This truly shows that we are a juan man team! without mata the wheels just fall off the bus! The subs made were completely idiotic I mean what is benayoun coming into the game for instead of marin or anyone really? also it was utterly pointless to have ba playing for 3 minutes I can't believe we can't even defend a 2 goal lead against the powerhouse reading team!

[YouNameIt 1,511]

So why Ba and not Terry?! why torres and not ba?! why bertrand?!WHY GOD WHY!

Because Ba is good even further down the pitch. Because when we clear the ball, Ba has the strenght to take it down, kill time and maybe even keep it.

Why Torres? well I hate the guy but we were up 2-0 so... Saying "we would of scored more goals with Ba on" is stuipid in THIS case. Just look at what oscar missed for example.

And why Bertrand? Again, we were up 2-0 and had a decent defensive team on.

[The Mak 4,459]

The "no time" to bring on Terry comment really gets on my tits. It's actually unbelievable he actually said that.

I mean, yeah sure, don't bring on our captain, an extra defender, for the last few minuties, don't break Reading's momentum, don't waste time, don't give our team leadership...

I'm not just coming down on Benitez here. If I was in the Chelsea locker room now, I'd probably slap everyone of them, bar Lamps and Mata.

[TorontoChelsea 4,064]

And 5 minutes before that, they bought on Rafael for Anderson and (I'm assuming because I haven't watched the game yet) moved Jones into midfield.

Benitez didn't put out his strongest team to start the game and he didn't act quick enough at the end. He said it himself. He said that they didn't have enough time to bring on Terry which actually sounds like bollocks, and is most likely a case of him trying to cover his enormous, fat arse.

Yes, because SAF has that option. He made three subs and only one of them was defensive which he could do because Jones is very capable of playing midfield. ManU starts with an incredibly attacking formation so going slightly more defensive is easy. What option did Chelsea have to go more defensive? We started with five defenders in the starting XI.. It was already a very defensive lineup. And it's not like Reading were coming on and Rafa didn't react. Reading had zero decent scoring chances until the 87th minute. We were dominating them. We looked much much more likely to score a third than they did to score at all. I want Rafa gone as much as the next guy, but I get annoyed at the knee-jerk blame stuff. We had 67% of possession, we outshot them 15-5. Did Rafa tell Oscar to keep missing the net? Did he say to his defenders "just stand in a bunch together and don't mark anyone?" At some point, the players have to take responsibility. I don't care who is on the pitch. You don't let a 2-0 lead against Reading with 8 minutes to go. Criticizing substitutions is easy because your alternate reality of substitutions will never exist so will forever be theoretically perfect. I am fine with criticizing Benitez for our lack of organization and even our lack of passion, but the players' have to take most of the blame for our poor performances. (the board gets a lot of it too. The inability to ensure that we have any depth has been disastrous.)

[Hutcho 8,443]

It makes no sense to not put on our most experienced defender and leader on the pitch to see the game out. Demba ba for torres makes perfect sense but was far too late and should have been done in the 60th minute or something. No one liked the starting line up but we had the lead so i won't talk about that even though torres over ba made little to no sense, but we got to be solid and protect a 2 goal cushion with 7 mins left. Even if you put someone on just to run the clock down but we still didn't make all 3 subs. Oscar should have put the game to bed though and had numerous chances but its getting annoying how he is the most useless at making subs ever.

[The only place to be 11,313]

Yes, because SAF has that option. He made three subs and only one of them was defensive which he could do because Jones is very capable of playing midfield. ManU starts with an incredibly attacking formation so going slightly more defensive is easy. What option did Chelsea have to go more defensive? We started with five defenders in the starting XI.. It was already a very defensive lineup. And it's not like Reading were coming on and Rafa didn't react. Reading had zero decent scoring chances until the 87th minute. We were dominating them. We looked much much more likely to score a third than they did to score at all. I want Rafa gone as much as the next guy, but I get annoyed at the knee-jerk blame stuff. We had 67% of possession, we outshot them 15-5. Did Rafa tell Oscar to keep missing the net? Did he say to his defenders "just stand in a bunch together and don't mark anyone?" At some point, the players have to take responsibility. I don't care who is on the pitch. You don't let a 2-0 lead against Reading with 8 minutes to go. Criticizing substitutions is easy because your alternate reality of substitutions will never exist so will forever be theoretically perfect. I am fine with criticizing Benitez for our lack of organization and even our lack of passion, but the players' have to take most of the blame for our poor performances. (the board gets a lot of it too. The inability to ensure that we have any depth has been disastrous.)

The thing is you seem to just be talking about personnel changes rather than tactical changes. He could've swapped Oscar or Bertrand for Terry and gone to five at the back. Don't forget, he didn't choose not to bring John Terry on, he ran out of time. This world class tactician couldn't make ONE subsititution in SIX minutes. Oh wait....yes he could. He brought on Ba for Torres, which I don't have a problem with in and of itself, but when we don't bring on a defender when we're defending a lead then it's somewhat irksome.

And this isn't kneejerk stuff. This is the same problem over and over again. Underestimating opposition and not playing his strongest team from the start and then making like-for-like substitutions rather than making changes to his oh so precious formation.

The point that few people seem to have mentioned is that Reading were utterly dire tonight. They were toothless in attack and aimless in defence and yet we still wasted chance after chance against them. Why are we not playing our strongest team in the league when the priority is fourth? Why has Demba Ba played about 15 minutes in the last two games, starting neither one?

Criticising substitutions might be easy. How about criticising a manager's inability to make a substitution when there's six minutes of extra time and you're defending a lead? Because those seem to be the fachts of the evening.

[Ollie 4,400]

That was gutting, the worst of the worst of the worst. I reached boiling point, now i've melted. My stream died in the 83rd minute so someone up there didn't want me to see the collapse i guess but i feel so bad. Arsenal came back from 2-0 down and we threw away a 2-0 lead. If us and Liverpool had won, 4th woulda been sewn up and 100% in the bag.

I'm so gutted i'm lost for words. I'm gonna ruin my bank account again and smash out some big moneys in a FUT Messi / Ronaldo hunt, i'm past giving a shit.

Got IF Podolski and IF Trapp, now time for part 2, fuck this shit.

[Blue Armour 4,439]

Clearly whoever's doing the opposition scouting for our team hasn't done their job right...

How else would our team leave Reading's killer sub Le Fondre unmarked for that last set-piece?

And the fact that around 3 opposition players were left free in our d-box? Poor management there? I think so...and I don't even want to mention the lateness of the substitutions..

[Yeboii 1,844]

I thought it looked pretty good for a short while. That last goal was just unlucky. Bring on a panic buy of Falcao and the next match!

[Rmpr 8,977]

UNBELIEVABLE! THIS SEASON IS BEYOND PATHETIC...

[manpe 10,861]

The moment Benitez brought on Ba on like 92nd minute was the moment I lost all faith in him, what an absolute joke of a manager. Now I actually miss AVB's subs, although often they were baffling too, but at least he wasn't completely braindead.

[Hutcho 8,443]

I don't particular like ifs and buts, but if ( ) we had went 5 at the back like we wanted to with 5 mins remaining with JT on, do you think we would have been as unorganised and unable to deal with the long ball... Obviously we have no way of answering that, but we would have had a huge arial prescense with jt ivan cahill and ba and JT is one of the best at organising and dictating where people should be etc... I don't know they may still have scored but what is the point of not putting him on? Are you telling me that Terry is not more beneficial than oscar in the last 3 mins of the game... Obviously he is, so why not just chuck him on with BA? Could he not be assed, or does he earn a bonus for not using all of his allotted 3 possible substituitions.

[Rmpr 8,977]

I don't particular like ifs and buts, but if ( )

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

EDIT: It is not only about having 5 on the back or whatever, just ask everyone to track back and defend. You dont really need 10 defensive players to maintain a 2-0 lead for 10min.

[zolayes 14,489]

gooners andspurs come back to rescue a point ..we throw two down the drain to to a relegation side ,,,,but not the coaches fault,,, actually it isnt ,,,its the STUPID FUCKING RUSSIAN

[TorontoChelsea 4,064]

The thing is you seem to just be talking about personnel changes rather than tactical changes. He could've swapped Oscar or Bertrand for Terry and gone to five at the back. Don't forget, he didn't choose not to bring John Terry on, he ran out of time. This world class tactician couldn't make ONE subsititution in SIX minutes. Oh wait....yes he could. He brought on Ba for Torres, which I don't have a problem with in and of itself, but when we don't bring on a defender when we're defending a lead then it's somewhat irksome.

And this isn't kneejerk stuff. This is the same problem over and over again. Underestimating opposition and not playing his strongest team from the start and then making like-for-like substitutions rather than making changes to his oh so precious formation.

The point that few people seem to have mentioned is that Reading were utterly dire tonight. They were toothless in attack and aimless in defence and yet we still wasted chance after chance against them. Why are we not playing our strongest team in the league when the priority is fourth? Why has Demba Ba played about 15 minutes in the last two games, starting neither one?

Criticising substitutions might be easy. How about criticising a manager's inability to make a substitution when there's six minutes of extra time and you're defending a lead? Because those seem to be the fachts of the evening.

I hated the starting XI because I hate Bertrand on the wing, but the team was almost as good as could have been (I would have preferred Benayoun/Marin for Bertrand and Ba is better than Torres but 9 of your best available 11 players is hardly fielding a weak lineup). I prefer Ba to Torres generally, but Torres was excellent he created about three or four very good chances, his movement was very good, and he worked hard. He was responsible for the first goal. Ba and Torres are going to rotate and I'd rather Torres play against weaker sides...and Ba is, I assume, going to start against Newcastle which we need him for. Also, switching formations is not a simple thing. Most teams don't do it during games. Players don't know where they are supposed to be, they don't know their responsibilities, their lanes, their outlets. I can criticize Benitez for doing defender for defender when we are behind and we have attacking players available. (Bringing on Ba on the 82nd minute against Brentford WAS inexcusable IMO.) but we had a defensive formation already.

Although I do have to question the marking on that last play...was it Rafa's zonal marking? I watched it again...just awful, so awful, it's almost impossible to comprehend. We had FIVE players in the middle of the box...who do we put on Le Fondre? Nobody! In fact, on the far side of the net, after our wall of Chelsea players, we have Benayoun and Azpilicueta marking four Reading players. The ball falls to the first of the Reading players and Benayoun and Azpilicueta close, he heads it on and there are THREE unmarked Reading players. In fact, even if Le Fondre forces a save, there are two unmarked Reading players now on the right side and still three on the left so a rebound is probably a goal as well. Players make mistakes, sometimes bad ones. It happens under every manager and to almost every player at some point, but that is one of the worst pieces of team defending I have ever seen from Chelsea and Rafa does need to take some blame for that. So many questions:

1-Why was the opposition's biggest goal threat not being marked at all?

2- Why where the closest players to him not someone like Cahill and Ivanovic but rather Azpilicueta and Benayoun?

3-Who was supposed to be marking which player because I have no idea even watching the clip repeatedly.

4-What the fuck??? .

[Kezza 1,965]

L to the mother fucking O L

[Hutcho 8,443]

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

EDIT: It is not only about having 5 on the back or whatever, just ask everyone to track back and defend. You dont really need 10 defensive players to maintain a 2-0 lead for 10min.

Of course not, but when it gets to the 92nd min after them scoring why don't you JT on as well, for everything he gives you including fresh legs. Oscar isn't exactly the best at tracking back and we have a lot of tired legs out there. You are right though we should be able to make no subs and protect a 2 goal lead with 7 mins left but my point is when you have the ability to ensure it even more throuhg the use of subs and when you have 1 of our greatest defensiver players and leaders of the last decade on the bench why not just put them on to help out, then he has done everything in his power to add to the team to make it even more likely we can hold on.

[AndersonBLUE 819]

truly disheartening. what is happening to our club? from the highs of last season to this. I'm just sick of these lineups and formations. Someone needs to come in and sort this team out because quite frankly I'm getting sick of watching every game like this one.

[Rmpr 8,977]

Of course not, but when it gets to the 92nd min after them scoring why don't you JT on as well, for everything he gives you including fresh legs. Oscar isn't exactly the best at tracking back and we have a lot of tired legs out there. You are right though we should be able to make no subs and protect a 2 goal lead with 7 mins left but my point is when you have the ability to ensure it even more throuhg the use of subs and when you have 1 of our greatest defensiver players and leaders of the last decade on the bench why not just put them on to help out, then he has done everything in his power to add to the team to make it even more likely we can hold on.

Oh no, I agree. I meant that it was even worse...

I think Benitez was shit but so was most of our players, it is pathetic!