8 minutes ago, Chelsbear said:

We don’t punt it up the park as per the managers way of playing, that’s what they are told to do......

Kepa made a pass any competent footballer would read and get to, unfortunately for him and is Zouma had another famous brain fart that he’s well known for. The guys a woeful CB and should never have come back. Too many on here still protecting him because of some games of 3/4 years ago when he was teenager. He’s not very good and can’t read a simple pass

Im not protecting Zouma, he is not the quality we urgently need. But that goes for Kepa as well, he just isnt a top notch keeper, he's about the level of Lloris and no more, he's not even in the top 3-4 in the league.

The youngsters are good,but still learning and with all the games played in this league they will tire,experience is needed and soon.

1 minute ago, Gol15 said:

He is the vice-captain! 

Still can’t figure out why he isn’t playing. 

Tired looking performance, not surprising with such a young team. The way that Tammy Abraham, Mason Mount and Pulusic are deliberately and repeatedly targeted doesn't help either. While the three players i mentioned are oozing with talent, they're still developing as players, and not yet streetwise enough. There are  after all, a lot of dirty bastards out there.

This naivety, lack of street smarts can also be levelled at Frank Lampard, who is still in the very early stages of his management career. 

I'm not going to make excuses, least of all for Kepa who unfortunately seems to have gone backwards this season. He needs to pick up his game massively -  and fast.

Lastly we suffered the new (interim) manager effect, Everton playing with more energy and more purpose than they have all season. Again, not an excuse. On the day, defensive mistakes cost us dear and we simply had no answer to the Everton revival.

Just now, hephzibah said:

That's not the reason we lost the match. 

i see that as none of our players was prepared to plan for attack...too casual..

that will not happen with Jorginho 

We need a leader, a voice.

Is Willy C worse than Kepa?  He can't be.

Got to be honest I thought that was a totally gutless performance, We can't be gifting the likes of West Ham and Everton free points like that.

Any crappy midtable team that look to be struggling always seem to get an immediate lift when they play us. Piss poor.

Need to get rid of Zouma. He's panicky on the ball if the opposing player is within 10 yards, otherwise tentative. Not a reliable and confidence inspiring centre half especially when you aspire to play out of the back.

Wouldn't mind a 6-1 thrashing at some point, would force us to focus on the defence. Our defensive problems have been swept under the rug since start of the season because we are bit better on the attack compared to last season. We were lucky against Ajax and Valencia could've scored a boatload the previous game. 

Today we had the chances but tried to walk it into the net instead of taking shots. 

Its tough for Frank to come in without an established CB pairing from last season & without first choice CB but the basic defensive structure looks vulnerable and the keeper isn't world class either.  

This to me is starting to look like the product of a thin squad of primarily weak back up players now catching up with us.

Kids break. Most players will play most of their games at about 70% fitness, that's what happens. Our kids are now entering the real football period of digging in an manning up. Having shown that initial promise andability, too many have been found out a bit and are now disappearing during games and need to be rested and rotated.

Mount for me looks miles off. He's not, he's a great prospect but he is miles off at the moment. Tomori started to look liek that as well. Zouma looks a bomb scare, Pulisic can be in and out. You only have to have 3-4 of these players off their game and that's it. Game over.

We desparately need a core of solid pros that our young stars can use as a foundation to build on.

I think SFL got it wrong.. by not playing a credible LB meant Everton virtually left Azpi alone.. it no surprise the one shot on target we had was when azpi did something positive.. 

Pusilic got marked out by double/triple teams .. which meant our delivery was restricted from the right .. which was we’re we created a couple of chances in the first half hour.

lamps changed the system for the second half with Willian instructed to go wide but the goal we conceded meant we pretty much had to tear up our plans..

Good interview from Lamps. You can tell he's seething at what he's seen.

15 minutes ago, Chelsbear said:

We don’t punt it up the park as per the managers way of playing, that’s what they are told to do......

Kepa made a pass any competent footballer would read and get to, unfortunately for him and is Zouma had another famous brain fart that he’s well known for. The guys a woeful CB and should never have come back. Too many on here still protecting him because of some games of 3/4 years ago when he was teenager. He’s not very good and can’t read a simple pass

Lamps just said about Kepa pass. If he completes that simple pass goal 3 doesn't occur.

Jorginho is irrelevant to what happened today, Everton were so fired up today, they've always had very good players, they won us there last season, they just had a bad spell under Marco Silva. Everton were very good. There were no spaces for us today, but maybe we would have gotten a draw in the match had it not been for Zouma's two errors.

We may need to get senior players with Leadership qualities in January.

Pulisic starting to look very lightweight in the challenge, the one part of Hazards game that was on another level.

Just hope this is not the kids being tired as the matches are coming thick and fast just now.

Kovacic the only player that can come away from this with his head held high everyone else extremely poor. Our defence really is bottom half standard absolutely woeful 2 new centre backs and a left back needed imo.

For perspective sake we are doing better than I thought we would be doing at this stage.

But, Frank now has tough decisions to make IMO, because if we really want to break into the top 4 then that triangle of the 2 centre backs and the goalkeeper needs to be seriously looked at.

We’ve not only got to play against the opposition we literally have to outscore our own defence.

Edited December 7, 20196 yr by 2211

In the pursuit of attractive football we have lost our dirtiness and spunk .. playing Chelsea seems enjoyable.. bunch of nice guys.. we need some aggression in our play.. 

4 minutes ago, Upsetter said:

Tired looking performance, not surprising with such a young team. The way that Tammy Abraham, Mason Mount and Pulusic are deliberately and repeatedly targeted doesn't help either. While the three players i mentioned are oozing with talent, they're still developing as players, and not yet streetwise enough. There are  after all, a lot of dirty bastards out there.

This naivety, lack of street smarts can also be levelled at Frank Lampard, who is still in the very early stages of his management career. 

I'm not going to make excuses, least of all for Kepa who unfortunately seems to have gone backwards this season. He needs to pick up his game massively -  and fast.

Lastly we suffered the new (interim) manager effect, Everton playing with more energy and more purpose than they have all season. Again, not an excuse. On the day, defensive mistakes cost us dear and we simply had no answer to the Everton revival.

Fair points and fair summary as far as I'm concerned.

Gutted (as usual) that we lost today.

3 minutes ago, Backbiter said:

Good interview from Lamps. You can tell he's seething at what he's seen.

Kind of think he said it as it is, especially about the third. Juts watch it again and teh pass from Kepa to Zouma is actually a bit of a reverse with both Christensen and Jmaes better options. So unnecessary.

1 minute ago, coco said:

Pulisic starting to look very lightweight in the challenge, the one part of Hazards game that was on another level.

Yes, that's part of Pulisic's game I am concerned with. Can he stood up for 90 min while continuously being targeted and assaulted. He's still learning, hope he adapts quick because defenders are not going to let him run free.

 

1 minute ago, coco said:

Pulisic starting to look very lightweight in the challenge, the one part of Hazards game that was on another level.

I think he'll learn like Hazard did to 'draw the foul' and if a player is persistently fouling him like Sidibe was today get him a yellow as early as possible to get them to back off. It will come with experience. 

Kepa is making too many mistakes and he doesn't command the area like a proper keeper should. We can see the cases of miscommunication between him and defenders in literally every game. He's nervy and unsure of himself and that makes everyone around him nervous and unsure.

Also, I'm not sure who's in charge of defensive training but that person's stealing a living. This is the softest and the most disorganized backline we've had in a very long time.

11 minutes ago, IndianaBlue85 said:

Still can’t figure out why he isn’t playing. 

Imo it's because he's a teamplayer that doesn't make runs with the ball, his style of play is different, Kante and Kovacic run with the ball more. Even so, he's a natural leader and can organize the team, I don't see Kante and Kovacic doing that. Furthermore, people used to complain about Jorginho getting yellow cards but it shows that he knew how important his role is because if the midfield is broken apart our defense offers little resistance to shots on target, now the squad is not even trying to make a tactical foul everyone are just too nice.