71-1 = 70 points
Chelsea Blip-O-Meter reading: 9.5
70-points means fourth.
If we are lucky.
We have already lost three games out of 10 (including our only two against “Contenders”). That is not the stuff of champions.
Well, well, well, welcome the Chelsea Football Club, André, where you can never stray too far from the Chelsea Blip-O-Meter, in case you need to may need to use it in a crisis. And boy, do you need to take a while digesting the most recent readings.
Reality Check:
While the conspiracy theorists may see nothing but bad decisions going against us, the fact is that a combination of fortuitous scheduling and occasionally generous refereeing had seen us appear to start the season rather better than we had, in fact, been playing (think back to Norwich, for example: Torres ought to have been off and the Norwich goalkeeper should have stayed on – then what?)
Our defence has been, ahem, shaky from the outset.
Our only clean sheet (so far) was the 0-0 Round One fixture at Stoke. Since then we have managed to concede goals to such Premier League powerhouses as: Swansea, West Bromwich Albion, QPR (Oh, the shame…), Norwich, Bolton and Sunderland. (That’s not counting the number of goals we ought to have shipped, were those sides to have been equipped with better players).
Now, Arsenal is not a very good team and the two goals at the end were the sort of things that sometimes happen. However, before Lampard had scored out first, we could have (should have) been 2-0 down. Not that we hadn’t created any opportunities (we should have scored at least three before then) but we had failed to finish any of them. And then we had been caught so badly out of shape that we had nearly gifted two goals to a very ordinary opposition.
Which we then promptly did soon afterwards.
Straight through the middle of a static defence.
Terry’s goal just before half-time should have allowed us to play the second half out in a controlled fashion.
Did it heck.
We then shipped two (while we continued to try to dink the ball over their full-backs’ heads – sorry, Wenger had already sorted that one and they were doubling up and leaving one player deeper).
Yes, they really should have lost a player to a red card– but we should have been so far out of sight by then that it didn’t matter.
Sn Villas-Boas, please sort it out – quick. A quick look at the schedule shows Liverpool, Newcastle, Manchester City and Tottenham on the horizon. Play like we did yesterday and we could get a similar caning in any/all of those.
Incidentally, while it is not uncommon for teams to practice 10 v 11 in pre-season games, some one should point out that it is now the end of October – not July at Kingstonian.
If they aren’t fit by now they never will be
Posted by Steve Symmons
| Match | Available | 11/12 | GF | GA | GD | 10/11 | GF | GA | GD | Par | PtsYTD | GFYTD | GAYTD | GDYTD |
| Stoke (a) | 2 | 0-0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1-1 | 1 | 1 | 0 | = | = | -1 | -1 | = |
| WBA (h) | 2-1 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 6-0 | 7 | 1 | 6 | = | = | -5 | = | -5 | |
| Norwich (Blackpool) (h) | 3-1 | 5 | 2 | 3 | 4-0 | 11 | 1 | 10 | = | = | -6 | +1 | -7 | |
| Sunderland (a) | 2-1 | 7 | 3 | 4 | 4-2 | 15 | 3 | 12 | = | = | -8 | = | -8 | |
| Man Utd (a) | 3 | 1-3 | 8 | 6 | 2 | 1-2 | 16 | 5 | 11 | = | = | -8 | +1 | -9 |
| Swansea (West Ham) (h) | 4-1 | 12 | 7 | 5 | 3-0 | 19 | 5 | 14 | = | = | -7 | +2 | -9 | |
| Bolton (a) | 5-1 | 17 | 8 | 9 | 4-0 | 23 | 5 | 18 | = | = | -6 | +3 | -9 | |
| Everton (h) | 2 | 3-1 | 20 | 9 | 11 | 1-1 | 24 | 6 | 18 | +2 | +2 | -4 | +3 | -7 |
| QPR (Birmingham) (a) | 3 | 0-1 | 20 | 10 | 10 | 0-1 | 24 | 7 | 17 | = | +2 | -4 | +3 | -7 |
| Arsenal (h) | 3-5 | 23 | 15 | 8 | 2-0 | 26 | 7 | 19 | -3 | -1 | -3 | +8 | -11 | |
| Blackburn (a) | 2-1 | 28 | 8 | 20 | ||||||||||
| Liverpool (h) | 3 | 0-1 | 28 | 9 | 19 | |||||||||
| Wolves (h) | 2-0 | 30 | 9 | 21 | ||||||||||
| Newcastle (a) | 2 | 1-1 | 31 | 10 | 21 | |||||||||
| ManCity (h) | 2-0 | 33 | 10 | 23 | ||||||||||
| Wigan (a) | 6-0 | 39 | 10 | 29 | ||||||||||
| Tottenham (a) | 2 | 1-1 | 40 | 11 | 29 |