PSG 3-1 Chelsea - Analysis of the decisions and mistakes that cost Chelsea!

It's Napoli all over again! A poor away performance in the Champions League in the second half has put us in a difficult position heading at Stamford Bridge next week. The game is far from over but Chelsea contributed to their own downfall once again.

Chelsea can score two goals against this lot next week as it will be a very different game. Chelsea after a nightmare start, pulled themselves together and walked in at half time in such a good position having got themselves back into the game with their tactics.

The goals (highlights here).

Now I have a problem with ALL of the goals as I believe Petr Cech should be doing more than he has for all of them. I will explain.

Psg 1-0 Chelsea

I'm not arguing with his technique and the finish but when the cross comes over, why hasn't Cech been on his toes and come off his line to collect the ball under NO PRESSURE rather than allow JT to try and deal with it on the edge of his own six yard box. Also, where is the call to JT to tell him to chest it down to him or even head the ball over the bar.

Psg 2-1 Chelsea

The second goal is even worse in my opinion. Just watch Cech here, he begins to come, gets caught watching the flight of the ball and keeping an eye on people rushing towards him and does literally nothing but shove his hands up in the air!

In games such as these, we need our Goalkeeper to be a commanding influence, we needed him to continue his movement towards the ball and win the ball first and take out anyone else in his way afterwards. The fact that he starts to come and then stops and move backwards means that he was always going to be in trouble.

You cannot blame David Luiz for the goal as he could literally do nothing with it on the line BUT I blame Luiz for giving away a needless free kick out wide when all he had to do was stand up and make life difficult.

Psg 3-1 Chelsea

Shocking defending all round here and for Cech to be beaten at his near post is a joke. Cesar Azpilicueta who had hardly put a foot wrong all season gets beaten far too easily. Frank Lampard gets turned inside out. No one comes to close Pastore down quick enough and as I said the near post finish is ridiculous.

Decisions.
Apart from the goals we conceded above, there were some key decisions made and not made that have literally contributed to the outcome and I believe that to be the case 100%. The decision to replace Andre Schurrle with Fernando Torres was the wrong one, the decision to move Eden Hazard off of the left wing and to bring him inside nearer to Torres was the wrong one and for Mikel to be left on the bench in favour of Frank Lampard when we needed to protect what we had was also the wrong one.

Schurrle:
Chelsea's success in the first half (after the nightmare start) came from us pressing high up the pitch. How many times did we win the ball back in the PSG half? How many times did we succeed in closing them down? Oscar, Willian, Ramires, Hazard, Luiz and Andre Schurrle were all up and at it. All of them won the ball back and forced PSG onto the back foot. Once we scored, PSG looked shell shocked and couldn't cope with us.

The second half started the same and Chelsea continued to press high and we were well in the game. So why on earth change it? Why take Schurrle off? I know he wasn't an influence with the ball at his feet but without it he was a pain in the arse to their back four and holding midfielders.

As soon as Torres came on, that intensity we had disappeared and there became a massive gap between our attacking three and Torres. As a result, Chelsea sat back and PSG found it easy to play their football to force us onto the back foot.

Hazard:
Why on earth did we move Hazard inside? Hazard was always a threat to PSG down the left hand side and as a result Edinson Cavani found himself tracking back to help out his right back to try and double up on him.

As soon as Hazard moved inside it became all too easy for PSG. Their right back was able to push forward time and time again. Hazard needed to be kept out wide.

Mikel for Lampard: 
I couldn't understand why Frank Lampard came on and not Mikel or why Mikel was not introduced by Mourinho in the second half when it seemed that David Luiz was becoming ragged in midfield?

In massive games like this, knowing we had the away goal, I would have been more than happy to shut up shop and protect what he had at 1-1. At the end of the day 1-1 is better than 3-1. People moan about Mikel but he would have been the perfect screen in front of our back four as the gap between Luiz and Ramires became too big.

Lampard did OK with the ball last night but was easily beaten for the Pastore goal. It's funny because those people who don't rate Mikel are now reliant on him for the home leg with Ramires suspended.

The Manager's comments:

"He [Gary Cahill] says sloppy. I say ridiculous. We played against a great team, full of good players especially attacking players. You would expect them to score fantastic goals. Not the goals they scored.

We lose the first goal in an easy position and we assist the striker. Nobody in second goal was there for a crucial position.

The second goal one of my players scores an own goal, it's unlucky, but the way the team positioned themselves defensively was not the right one. Finally, the third goal was sloppy -- Gary uses that word -- but for me, ridiculous." 

I agree 100% with Mourinho and his comments.

Conclusion.
As I said I believe this game is far from over. The positives we can take from the game is our first half performance high up the pitch, the fact that Ibrahimovic looks like being out of the return leg and the away goal.

Chelsea needed to buck their ideas up last night after a poor display at Palace and for two thirds of this one we had done OK.

If we are to turn this round, we need another Napoli at Stamford Bridge like performance but this time we have no Didier Drogba. Someone needs to step up and be counted, let's hope Samuel Eto'o is back!

Poor from Chelsea, poor decisions made and mistakes that have really cost us.