After nearly two months away, there was a wonderful feeling of familiarity when making my long-awaited return to Stamford Bridge yesterday for Chelsea vs Newcastle. With the sun shining, it finally felt as though spring had arrived and I opted to take a nice walk across London from south of the river to the SW6 postcode. Honestly, I was in an unbelievably good mood.
The Waterside, overlooking the Thames, played host to a couple of hours of intense pre-match discussion. A few key themes emerged… most notably around who would start in goal. On a more personal level, I found myself getting extremely annoyed at people leaving the door by our table open, which kept a constant cool breeze flowing through the pub.
Where to even begin with Wednesday night’s performance, the very thought of it now is still painful. We went toe to toe, realistically outplaying the European Champions but ultimately individual errors now mean we’re out of the competition for another season. I can’t quite get my head around what Rosenior was thinking with his selection choice.
I was playing in a work ‘5-a-side’ league on Tuesday night, so I unfortunately missed Tottenham Hotspur’s collapse against Atletico Madrid, but having seen the highlights, you naturally felt sympathy for Antonín Kinský, who was thrown in and consequently well out of his depth. Not 24 hours later, Liam Rosenior decided to put Filip Jörgensen in the same situation. Of course I have nothing against Filip, but everything I’ve seen of him in the last 18 months suggests he is not Chelsea level.
That same 5-a-side game meant that I missed Newcastle United’s draw against Barcelona, but I hear they were impressive. Indeed, only a moment of madness prevented them heading to the Nou Camp next Wednesday with a one-goal advantage.
Seeing quite a rotated Newcastle United starting XI, I saw no reason that our group of players wouldn’t be able to bounce back from Wednesday night, especially with the visitors’ poor away record.
Being back at Stamford Bridge felt wonderful. There are few prettier stadiums in the Premier League when there’s a clear blue sky hanging over it. The overload of blue just looks superb.
It’s hard to put into words just how poor and lacklustre this performance was. I have no idea what happened. Nobody was at the races in what was simply a must-win game in our battle for top five. Perhaps it was a hangover from midweek events, but we looked totally devoid of all creativity.
Once again, our discipline record likely cost us, I can’t help but think Pedro Neto would’ve made a massive difference in how we lined up. We looked totally lost going down the right wing.
I’d love to dive a bit deeper into analysis of this game, but the reality is absolutely nothing happened. Post-game, we were trying to work out who the Man of the Match could’ve been for Chelsea, and barely a single positive thought came to mind. Incredibly, I believe it might have been our keeper.
Liam Rosenior has now been at the helm for two and a half months. If I were to grade his time at the club so far, it would be a C. He was fortunate to come into the club during a pretty beneficial run of fixtures and I appreciate the fact that we’ve put a couple of lower-placed teams to the sword.
What started initially as just a couple of losses against Arsenal in the cup, has now turned into three losses against Arsenal in all competitions, and defeats against Paris Saint-Germain and Newcastle in absolutely pivotal games for our season. I appreciate he’s a young and charismatic coach, still learning his craft, but Chelsea Football Club is not the place to do that.
I’m finding it hard to get myself too psyched up for the second leg of our Champions League tie. That being said, one of my fondest football memories is watching Demba Ba’s 87th minute winner in our quarter final tie against PSG in 2014. The fifth goal on Tuesday may have put a repeat of this out of reach, but stranger things have happened.
The Shed Diaries 