Closed Chelsea 2-2 Swansea

[The Chels 2,502]

It now provides a convenient excuse but a truly great team should be comfortable playing with 10 men at home IMO. But just like against Burnley last year we were never going to win when we had one player less.

[jeronimo 130]

Looked good until the red card besides our defence.

It's obvious we need some signings. Minimum I hope we bring in John Stones and a LB so we can move azpi to the right. A cm and rw would be a bonus.

[MrBlueGuy 1,552]

Happy to take a draw given the circumstances. That was the sort of game we'd have lost under Ancelotti, Villas-Boas, di Matteo. Lots of things going against us, but overall I don't think anyone can begrudge Swansea a point and we didn't deserve anything from the game.

Positives

• Willian - outstanding in attack. Visibly tired as the game progressed but looked by far the most potent of our midfielders.
• Costa - again, excellent. Very glad to see him come through the game despite injury concerns, and though he tired as well, he looked a threat.
• Begovic. Horrible circumstances for him to make his début in, did extremely well and made one or two excellent saves. I'm not at all concerned that Courtois is out for three games, tbh.
• The result. A draw isn't a nightmare. The last time we drew our first game of the season we won the Champions League. Swansea missed a brilliant chance to get all three points today. If they'd have shown more conviction they'd be going home with a win.

Negatives

• Ivanovic and Fabregas - both utterly atrocious. Look well, well short of match fitness and almost everything they did was woeful.
• Hazard. Though he grew into the game in the last 10-15 minutes, he was otherwise anonymous. Disappointed with that.
• Willian - technically at fault for both goals.Willian played Gomis onside and was nowhere to be found on the first goal either, leaving Ivanovic to defend two with Matic having to be pulled over
• Our moaning at the end of the game. Fucking deal with it, lads. We got a point when we didn't deserve one. No point complaining about the Courtois decision - correct to award a red card and point to the spot. That was about the only decision the referee got right.

Shit happens. We're going to have a slow start, I guarantee you that. We might only have 6 or 7 points after our first four matches. But we'll come good, just you watch. We're too good not to.

By coming good you mean we will finish top 3 then obviously...unless Hazard, Costa and Matic out for 3 months each, we have too much quality not to.

[cosmicway 1,333]

We played fine with 11. Unlikely circumstances happened and it lead to the scoreline. As well as a terrible reffing job. Jesus...

So many positives though, that most on here will overlook because we drew.

Who is that new number 8 we signed? Some 50 million dollar wonderkid? If Oscar can play like he did in the first half all season, we essentially have ourselves a new player. He was brilliant. One of the best halves in a Chelsea shirt I've seen by any player in a while.

It did n't look as if we were playing with 10 men - if you forget that we allowed them to created chances.

There were some worrying defensive mistakes before and after but up front in was Gobi desert. The two goals we scored were among the most fortuitious we ever scored.

Costa was good for a beach team, Iva poor but the man is not a playmaker.

Although it's not as if we did n't fluff any last season -e.g. Burnley- It's getting worrying.

[BlueLion. 21,491]

By coming good you mean we will finish top 3 then obviously...unless Hazard, Costa and Matic out for 3 months each, we have too much quality not to.

You must be the most pessimistic person on earth.

It's one game. Still 111 points available.

[didierforever 7,349]

our players clearly are not to their best fitness yet. we were very good in the first half (courtesy oscar), and then every possible thing that could go wrong, went wrong.

courtois - needless. dont know what he was thinking. better to conceded than go a man down. 4/10

azpi - decent game. got some problems with ayew early on but all in all, was good. 7/10

JT - very odd game. missed tackles, missed offsides. very unlike JT. 5/10

GC - one of our only defenders that could hold his head high. seems far more confident this year, even his ball playing has improved. 7/10

iva - atrocious. absolutely atrocious. could not handle montero. slowed down our attack. and that last chance where he had some 5 yard place at the edge of the box and got dispossessed symbolised his game. shameful. if i was jose, i would strip him off his vice captaincy and bench him for 10 games. seemed disinterested. i mean that run off routledge where he just let him go and let GC deal with it like it was not his job. hopeless. needs to be dropped. -10/10

matic - bossed it. 8/10

cesc - very very poor. cant believe he was not subbed off. i mean what the fuck does he try to do after reaching the opposition box. who the fuck does he think he is trying to glide thru 5 defenders. just take a fucking shot or pass it or at the fucking least dont lose the ball. 2/10

hazard - clearly unfit. 5/10

oscar - amazing performance. what back flips. cant believe he was subbed. WTF jose!!! 10/10

willian - good in attack. but should have kicked iva to wake up. 7/10

costa - decent. but i think his name precedes him now. that ashley williams thing was a definite foul.

subs -

begovic - very good. commanding. not at all worried about courtois suspended.

zouma - good outing.

falcao - decent run in. looked like he was up for it. really excited to see what he can offer.

[Amblève. 4,995]

I only saw the second half so keep that in mind while reading my post. I don't have a clue what happened in the first.

Courtois is pretty bad off the line. Not the first time that he looked clumsy leaving his goal to play the ball, this time his timing etc were completely off. Shit happens but this is definitely an area he has to work on.

Ivanovic, whom I defend more often than not, just got fucked hard on that right flank. Basically every attack from Swansea came from his side in the second half; they clearly targeted him and it worked.

On to the much bigger problem, though... DAT bench. It's just straight up embarrassing how weak our depth is. Mourinho brought on Zouma for Fabregas FFS. Just imagine - IMAGINE! - having a top-class midfielder be there to replace Matic or Fabregas when one of them is shit or a change is simply necessary...

[LDN Blue 7,903]

It now provides a convenient excuse but a truly great team should be good enough to play with 10 men at home IMO. But just like against Burnley last year we were never going to win when we had one player less.

Agreed, made the point earlier. There are teams, where when a red card produced, who can handle one less man and still be an organised composed team. Then there's Chelsea, if anything we like to dig a bigger whole than we're usually in. I'm surprised we didn't have second. In previous games where we've had a man sent off, QPR & City we've ended up with 9 men.

[CMS 382]

Even a striker like Gomis was exploiting our defence, god help us

He always does. Go back and watch his past games against Swansea. Both JT and Cahill always struggle against the likes of him. Nothing new here.

[dmode 113]

We played fine with 11. Unlikely circumstances happened and it lead to the scoreline. As well as a terrible reffing job. Jesus...

So many positives though, that most on here will overlook because we drew.

Who is that new number 8 we signed? Some 50 million dollar wonderkid? If Oscar can play like he did in the first half all season, we essentially have ourselves a new player. He was brilliant. One of the best halves in a Chelsea shirt I've seen by any player in a while.

Great post. My thoughts exactly

[edetarod 2,155]

it's going to be a long season

[MrBlueGuy 1,552]

You must be the most pessimistic person on earth.

It's one game. Still 111 points available.

Nope just really frustated with how we handled our business this season. There were cracks from the 1st game of preseason but most people brushed it off as just 'preseason' and also no concern over our failure of strengthening the team, now we are being exposed.

Yes but it is not gonna magically improve, we will get better but probably not our Aug-Dec period last year again.

[Styles 9,790]

Our team is starting to lack mobility in several areas. Terry, Cahill, Ivanovic, Matic and Fabregas are so slow, man.

[chrismada9 1,948]

We were an embarrassment to be honest!

What annoys me, is that we sell Petr Cech to Arsenal of all teams, then Courtois gets a red card in the opening game!

Begovic though, can't take away the fact that he was solid when he came on.. made some great saves, but what that means now, is that we've not won any of our last 6 games within 90 minutes!

And next week we have City away! Can't even contemplate the situation right now! Need to lie down!

[Eidur the Spider 4,515]

Thought Cahill had a great game. Really impressed.

[bethos1 802]

Happy to take a draw given the circumstances. That was the sort of game we'd have lost under Ancelotti, Villas-Boas, di Matteo. Lots of things going against us, but overall I don't think anyone can begrudge Swansea a point and we didn't deserve anything from the game.

Positives

• Willian - outstanding in attack. Visibly tired as the game progressed but looked by far the most potent of our midfielders.
• Costa - again, excellent. Very glad to see him come through the game despite injury concerns, and though he tired as well, he looked a threat.
• Begovic. Horrible circumstances for him to make his début in, did extremely well and made one or two excellent saves. I'm not at all concerned that Courtois is out for three games, tbh.
• The result. A draw isn't a nightmare. The last time we drew our first game of the season we won the Champions League. Swansea missed a brilliant chance to get all three points today. If they'd have shown more conviction they'd be going home with a win.

Negatives

• Ivanovic and Fabregas - both utterly atrocious. Look well, well short of match fitness and almost everything they did was woeful.
• Hazard. Though he grew into the game in the last 10-15 minutes, he was otherwise anonymous. Disappointed with that.
• Willian - technically at fault for both goals.Willian played Gomis onside and was nowhere to be found on the first goal either, leaving Ivanovic to defend two with Matic having to be pulled over
• Our moaning at the end of the game. Fucking deal with it, lads. We got a point when we didn't deserve one. No point complaining about the Courtois decision - correct to award a red card and point to the spot. That was about the only decision the referee got right.

Shit happens. We're going to have a slow start, I guarantee you that. We might only have 6 or 7 points after our first four matches. But we'll come good, just you watch. We're too good not to.

I agree with everything except for Willian, I though he was shit and he should have come off instead of Oscar

[Gappy 130]

I agree with MrExcalibur100

Anytime we lead it's just like we shut down the system

Play like killing the clock, brain derp or save energy mode

And when we got draw or lead , Suddenly we start running like a chicken without head, run around crazy

but still no formation or pattern to create the attack , pure personal ability

[The Mak 4,459]

Probably the most frustrating thing for me is that Iva had one of his worst games ever and was a liability throughout the entire game, but will he be dropped? Fuck no. The only way Brana is not getting picked is if he breaks his leg. Yet Mourinho only needs 10 mins to diagnose if a youth player can make it? Haha, go pull the other one.

[chrismada9 1,948]

iva - atrocious. absolutely atrocious. could not handle montero. slowed down our attack. and that last chance where he had some 5 yard place at the edge of the box and got dispossessed symbolised his game. shameful. if i was jose, i would strip him off his vice captaincy and bench him for 10 games. seemed disinterested. i mean that run off routledge where he just let him go and let GC deal with it like it was not his job. hopeless. needs to be dropped. -10/10

Would you say it's the worst game he has ever played in his Chelsea career??

[Billy. 2,742]

what more has brana got to do to prove he is pony at RB??