12 minutes ago, Floyd25 said:

Can't do much about flukey goals, can do something about lack of commitment. I accept we don't have the quality we used to in some areas, can't accept lack of effort from some players. We are penny pinching in the market, maybe due to costs from the upcoming stadium work, don't think Conte is happy with recruitment, can see him and Haz leaving, it'll be difficult replacing them. We may have to deal with the fact we'll be out of the title picture for a while, we could use it as an opportunity to get a return on our youth investment, I don't mean loan & sell and there will be a resurgence at some stage, maybe once the stadium rebuild is finished. 

Youth like Kennedy! Man of the Match performance last week and goes out on loan. He is more than a wing back. With the right guidance he has the ability to be a decent midfielder. Gutted to see him go out. We needed his energy tonight.

I am sick to death of playing like Pish against Arsenal. That's about 4 victories Wenger has over Conte now I'm sure and 2 draws at Stamford Bridge... Quite scary. 

31 minutes ago, Strider6003 said:

Conte got the team selection wrong, it should have been the same side at Norwich as it was our first win after several draws.

Musonda should also have been on the bench.

No blame for any player yet for me the wrong team selection.

I thought Conte was spot on with the team selection, with Pedro/Willian/Hazard up top we pressed from the front and Bakayoko and Kante were initiating the second press to perfection. We didn't give Arsenal the time to pick us off and they had to revert to long balls over the top. I have nothing against Barkley but for me Conte's mistake was as you say not selecting/replacing Willian with Musonda, or if Musonda was unavailable for whatever reason Hudson-Odoi - we may have lost anyway but if we'd just kept up the intensity/pressing from the front the result may have been a different outcome. Pressing that high up the pitch just isn't Barkley's game imho.

Edited January 25, 20188 yr by the special one

see again quotes being misquoted across twitter by journos or picked out and changed to suit agenda. nowhere near as bad as they make it sound when you hear and see him speak at the post presser. some journos are so annoying with their clickbaity tweets

 

Edited January 25, 20188 yr by enigma

Can't believe we lost to that sh*te again, especially as they relied on two huge lucky deflections to score...in saying that we did little after Willian went off...bringing Barkley on was wrong move, he clearly isn't match fit...just shows once again how little he rates Batshuayi.

still, Conte has beaten them just once in eight matches and that is terrible, especially as this is the worst arsenal side under Wenger, which is saying something given the slide they've been on for years now

11 minutes ago, The Brit said:

Can't believe we lost to that sh*te again, especially as they relied on two huge lucky deflections to score...in saying that we did little after Willian went off...bringing Barkley on was wrong move, he clearly isn't match fit...just shows once again how little he rates Batshuayi.

still, Conte has beaten them just once in eight matches and that is terrible, especially as this is the worst arsenal side under Wenger, which is saying something given the slide they've been on for years now

Agreed. Why puts Batman on the bench if you will not use him for all bar a few mins? Waste of a bench spot.

2 hours ago, the special one said:

I thought Conte was spot on with the team selection, with Pedro/Willian/Hazard up top we pressed from the front and Bakayoko and Kante were initiating the second press to perfection. We didn't give Arsenal the time to pick us off and they had to revert to long balls over the top. I have nothing against Barkley but for me Conte's mistake was as you say not selecting/replacing Willian with Musonda, or if Musonda was unavailable for whatever reason Hudson-Odoi - we may have lost anyway but if we'd just kept up the intensity/pressing from the front the result may have been a different outcome. Pressing that high up the pitch just isn't Barkley's game imho.

Yep, you have to look beyond the result here. A couple of lucky ricochets and they got the result but I thought our overall play was good and had control of most of the game, although chances were few and far between from both sides. Bakayoko is astounding everybody with his return to form and, of course, confidence on the ball. I thought Barkley did well considering he hasn't played for eons. He showed some much needed pace in the team. I don't know the stats but it seemed to me that, every time he got on the ball, he was fouled.

2 hours ago, Petworth Chelsea Fan said:

Youth like Kennedy! Man of the Match performance last week and goes out on loan. He is more than a wing back. With the right guidance he has the ability to be a decent midfielder. Gutted to see him go out. We needed his energy tonight.

Agreed, he was played out of position, he's not a wing back, he's a winger/striker. But, because of our failure in the market, he was utilised as back up to Alonso, could have been half decent there, given more time, we'll have to see how Emerson performs, if he comes in. Policy on young players has to change, otherwise what's the point in pouring money in to the academy? These are good players, beating senior men's teams on a regular basis and as we're struggling to compete in the market, seems sensible to give some of these kids a chance, instead of buying average or garbage. 

I've managed to think of a positive that may come out of this grim occasion...who knows, maybe this will convince arse and Wenger that he should stay on another year...

4 hours ago, ivorycoast said:

Rudiger isn't Chelsea quality imo. Why we bought a player who was average at Roma is a mystery.

He barely has put a foot wrong since joining and he was unlucky tonight with the 2 goals conceded. Other than that, thought he was solid for most of the night. He has been one of the unsung heroes for the season.

Dreadful... u sort of knew we weren’t going to beat a very average Arsenal side, even B4 the game had started.

A sort of inevitability about it !!!

u miss Drogs on nights like this.

this transfer policy of buying crocks on the cheap (Ross) is biting us on the bum.

the next two coming are a striker past his best, on the cheap and another crock, coming back from a serious injury on the cheap.

if I was Conte I would get the hell out. However, he is definitely partially to blame.

Edited January 25, 20188 yr by cfcblue

Really disappointing. Dont see a single silver lining.

pedro was dreadful. Absolutely dreadful.

Barkley is coming back from an injury but dont know how he is better than musonda.

Need a proper striker. Dzeko would do and would do very well infact. 

1 hour ago, STATS said:

He barely has put a foot wrong since joining and he was unlucky tonight with the 2 goals conceded. Other than that, thought he was solid for most of the night. He has been one of the unsung heroes for the season.

Some people just look at the stats and read the match report rather than watch the game it seems. Even with the own goal and deflected shot, Rudiger still had a decent game. Sometimes sh*t happens like that. Plenty of players in the past have tried to block a shot and deflected the ball into the net or toward an opposition player. I would be more concerned if our CB's were avoiding those types of situations. The last thing you want to see in your CB's is them being afraid to block shots.

Nacho Monreal - the biggest threat from set pieces. John Terry does not like this.

We used to beat this average team with average coach with 4-2-3-1. One of the two was Fabregas. How did Jose manage to beat them with only 5 defensive players regularly and Conte is 1/8. Please, next time we play Arsenal, pretend to be sick and let someone else running the game. The gardener, the security. They will do better.

9 hours ago, carrickblue said:

I think Conte is just marking time until he's sacked or the season ends. 

Where's the big idea to refresh what we are doing. You just can't stand still you've to give opponents something different to think about. 

I think that’s what’s happening and has been for a little while.He’s a goner, he knows it, we know it. It’s clear as day.

Why are we still buying mediocre players from Italy then, that nobody wants?

Edited January 25, 20188 yr by Pendergast

Should have had it sewn up by half time.Willian going off was massive and any luck going went to a poor Arsenal side.To rub salt in Granite Crapper scores the winner.One of those nights.....UP THE CHELS !

18 minutes ago, Bobbywoodhogan said:

I think that’s what’s happening and has been for a little while.He’s a goner, he knows it, we know it. It’s clear as day.

 

5 hours ago, The Brit said:

Can't believe we lost to that sh*te again, especially as they relied on two huge lucky deflections to score...in saying that we did little after Willian went off...bringing Barkley on was wrong move, he clearly isn't match fit...just shows once again how little he rates Batshuayi.

still, Conte has beaten them just once in eight matches and that is terrible, especially as this is the worst arsenal side under Wenger, which is saying something given the slide they've been on for years now

Came on to post but that was what I was going to say almost word for word.

So Angry. Angry that we have lost to a poor Arsenal side AGAIN. Angry that we lost to two scrappy, flukey goals. But more Angry at how absolutely sh*te we were. It was another second half where we looked clueless and again never looked lik scoring another goal.

Conte is clearly off. Our signings are laughable. God knows who our next manager is going to be. Another period of transition for us, I am not sure Hazard will hang around much longer. 

5 hours ago, old git said:

Yep, you have to look beyond the result here. A couple of lucky ricochets and they got the result but I thought our overall play was good and had control of most of the game, although chances were few and far between from both sides. Bakayoko is astounding everybody with his return to form and, of course, confidence on the ball. I thought Barkley did well considering he hasn't played for eons. He showed some much needed pace in the team. I don't know the stats but it seemed to me that, every time he got on the ball, he was fouled.

That's the worry, most people have looked beyond the result and it's another performance of creating f**k all. 1 shot on target each half, City, Liverpool or even Spurs would do more than that when your 2-1 down in the cup semi final. People talk about dominating the first half but that's when your suppose to create chances, Chelsea created nothing. 

Didn't manage to watch the game as i was at a gig but saw their first goal on my phone. How did Pedro play? Thought he'd been the biggest passenger this season. If he was sh*te why are we not giving Charly a run about..

1 minute ago, RIP Mourinho said:

Didn't manage to watch the game as i was at a gig but saw their first goal on my phone. How did Pedro play? Thought he'd been the biggest passenger this season. If he was sh*te why are we not giving Charly a run about..

Personally I thought he was anonymous apart from having a hand in the interplay for the first goal. 

I still don't understand how we managed to concede a goal from corner, scored by Monreal. This is unexplainable. 

2 minutes ago, RIP Mourinho said:

Didn't manage to watch the game as i was at a gig but saw their first goal on my phone. How did Pedro play? Thought he'd been the biggest passenger this season. If he was sh*te why are we not giving Charly a run about..

Throughout a season, Pedro will give you some good moments and score a few goals, but he is becoming more and more frustrating. Too lightweight and as you say, a passenger. Disappointing not to have Musonda on the bench last night as he could have come on for Willian rather than Barkley who looked way off the pace and did very little.