Socrates

Awful first half. But I didn't think we'd blow it so spectacularly after the break. We're in worse shape than I thought Willian had a terrible game. Blew our best chances. Screwed up for the first goal. Morata is looking like a lost cause. Giroud not much better. Kante looked hopelessly lost. Azpi and Alonso were all over the shop. We really screwed up being lumbered with a pair of mediocre strikers and an ageing pair of wingers. Christensen's confidence looks shot. Cahill is off. Luiz is an accident waiting to happen. The team is broken. Sarri has got a huge job on his hands just to stop us sliding down the table. Never mind trying to mould this lot into an attractive footballing side. What a mess.

We'd have been better off keeping Tammy Abraham and Batshuayi. Problem is we blew so much money on Morata that the Board and manager feel obliged to stick with him. Feel we need to bite the bullet in January and cut our losses on Morata. But we won't.

Despite our first half lead we’d created little of note. Morata was reaching a new level of awful and Willian was playing like he’d left his brain at home. Two bad calls from Sarri. Giroud and Pedro start and we win that game comfortably. Credit to Barkley for being in the right place at the death and Luiz for the header, somewhat making up for going AWOL for their first goal. Good point in the end but Sarri needs to bite the bullet in future. Not sure he can just keep starting Morata and hoping he’s turned a corner. He hasn’t and he won’t. I’d start Pedro and Hudson- Odoi over Willian too.

Thought we were very good. Strong defensively. And slick in midfield. And we have Hazard who’s a sublime talent. Just imagine where we’d be with a decent striker. If we fall short this season, which I think we will, it’s because neither Giroud or Morata are capable of scoring enough goals. I seriously hope we’re in for a striker in January. Such a bloody shame we couldn’t find a way to have kept Diego Costa. Would have made such a difference to this team.

2-0 and a majority of the possession looks comfortable. But they had the best chances before we took the lead and we looked vulnerable when they attacked. Luckily their finishing was wayward and Sarri’s substitutions turned the game in our favour. Giroud gave us a presence upfront and Pedro’s directness gave us an edge, albeit with a deflected shot. Still a work in progress. Our central defence lacks solidity and Azpi’s crossing was pretty awful. Alonso was terrific going forward though. Hazard, Jorginho, Kante and Kovacic is a pretty classy midfield. If Sarri can just sort out the defensive lapses and find a way to turn Morata into Diego Costa we’d be a formidable team.

Warning signs were there even when we were 2 up. Some shocking defending, no one attacking the ball, players standing off. Really amateur stuff. On the plus side, Hazard was magnificent, Kovacic looked class and Morata scored. Sarri just needs to sort out our awful defending.

7/10 Not too shabby, with a new midfield, a new keeper, we kept Hazard, Kante and Willian, and integrated Loftus-Cheek, Barkley and Hudson-Odoi into the first team. Centre forward position looks our weak point unless Morata manages to come good. Not overly convinced by our back four. But hopefully our midfield will offer us more protection than we’ve been used to lately.

This is what happens with Marina in charge. She failed to seal the Allison deal, the only realistic high quality keeper available, and now she's scrabbling about with three days to go for Butland. Really, how she's still in a job is beyond me.

It's not a surprise that City are way ahead of us. But what's really worrying is that we look like we've made no progress since last season. And that we're going to struggle just to improve on fifth place. We don't look like we've got enough goalscorers in the team. We need a CF and a winger and an attacking midfielder. It's unlikely now, but without some additions it's going to be a really difficult season.

Man City toying with us really. We look desperately average. So much wrong with us it's hard to know where to start. Just a few days to get this transfer window right or we're in for a really difficult season.

"could cost in excess of 100m". Don't know where they get these figures from. I assume they estimate wages, guess a fee and then double it.

And a free pizza.

Conte couldn’t have screwed up the end of the season any better. Get on a winning streak and then rotate with two games to go. The man’s a genius. Utterly hopeless and clueless performance today. Don’t know who was more bewildered: the players or the manager. A suitable epitaph for Conte’s disastrous second year. A crashing defeat to bookend our entire season. Good luck to the new boss. Glad Bruce Buck was forced to travel north to watch the whole unedifying spectacle. Hope he learned something more than we need a new manager as soon as possible.

Goodbye Conte. Great first season followed by an utter shambles of a second season. From the sublime to the ridiculous in just three days. Story of our season in a nutshell. Don’t tamper with a winning side with two games to go and a CL spot on the line. Pretty fuc**ng simple stuff. Nagging feeling is that if Conte wasn’t going he wouldn’t dare have put out that side. Abramovich should have sacked him months ago.

Just when the team finds a formation and form, Conte chooses the wrong game to rotate. Criminally irresponsible team selection tonight. Sums up his really poor judgement at times this season. Will not be sorry to see the back of him.