WTF was Gusto doing here! Who else through the controls at the tv? Minutes later they equalise.

Game looked so comfortable and we somehow screwed it up. This and the game against a piss poor Man U is 6 points dropped from what should have been an easy couple of fixtures.

Should have been 1 point behind Liverpool with them to play next week. Now we’re already miles off with no centrebacks and most likely going to get smashed.

Dumb decisions from players and manager every match. We are our own worst enemy constantly shooting ourselves in the foot with an AK47

Let it not be said I don't critique Trev.

That was a boneheaded call to challenge for the ball in that situation. It is worse than what Sanchez did. Robert was still a moron but Trev even more so. Let the player go and get back as best as possible. Maybe the attacker blows it, maybe Sanchez saves it. If he scores is still 1- and 11 on 11. Foolish.

No manager can be this bad. You have to screw up on so many levels to get such a result: from training, starting line-up, tactics, in-game management, subs. I mean it’s all got to be bad to end up losing 3-1 at home to Brighton. How did he do it? He gets paid an absolute fortune to be merely decent. Board aren’t even asking him to win anything. Just be fourth. Just not be a laughing stock. What is going on?

4 hours ago, Jangz said:

This is a circus.. people on this forum defend the directors when I started a thread about them.. what kind of football club construction is this.. we had a Hato, Acheampong, Santos and Estevao all below 20 play majority of the minutes??

Less said about maresca the better .. he was a coward for bringing off Esteaveo and not bringing on garnacho or gittens.. just before we conceded gusto had a chance to break through and he paused .. he was bought on to defend and both goals were conceded from Side and he could have given a penalty away.. took away all are threat and invited pressure on 20 year olds.

This.

I don’t like some of marescas choices like Enzo closer to the opposition goal — does not fit his skillset. Estevao is still pretty erratic at 18 tho. I don’t have a crystal ball to know what would have happened if x or y, but we all have our preferences.

acheampong Has already showed me enough to know that his current level is a liability in the PL. 2 goals on him today: first allowing a free header marking no one and second losing the ball in a dangerous area. Don’t get me wrong—I’m sure he can improve and become a very good player in the future, but right now he ain’t one.

That’s roster… whoever comes next will face the same issues.

3 hours ago, charierre said:

WTF was Gusto doing here! Who else through the controls at the tv? Minutes later they equalise.

The scary thing is our manager would probably mark that as a good decision.

13 minutes ago, dkw said:

The scary thing is our manager would probably mark that as a good decision.

Yeah. There’s no way a player would do that unless he thought he was doing the manager’s bidding. This is what they train on every day and it’s why Gusto gets picked. Maresca is slowly ruining every player he comes into contact with. Then the players are getting blamed for putting in poor displays. But they’re just a reflection of the manager. Isn’t that how it works?

It's laughable really. We took so much out of Brighton, yet they have beaten us 3 times in a row. If it wasn't for the brilliance of Palmer last season, they would have beaten us then too. We could buy their entire club at this point and they would probably still beat us.

5 minutes ago, Scott Harris said:

We could buy their entire club at this point and they would probably still beat us.

We pretty much have!

55 minutes ago, Mod said:

We pretty much have!

Brighton higher ups told up we would not make it work unless we got Tony Bloom as well.

4 hours ago, axman2526 said:

Let it not be said I don't critique Trev.

That was a boneheaded call to challenge for the ball in that situation. It is worse than what Sanchez did. Robert was still a moron but Trev even more so. Let the player go and get back as best as possible. Maybe the attacker blows it, maybe Sanchez saves it. If he scores is still 1- and 11 on 11. Foolish.

Worse than Sanchez? 😂😂😂

5 hours ago, charierre said:

WTF was Gusto doing here! Who else through the controls at the tv? Minutes later they equalise.

The pass was underhit

Edited September 28, 2025Sep 28 by Bob stark

Enzo made slow pass across the field in your backline, it is Chalobah fault.

Santos made a brilliant through ball for your opp to create 2 v 1 vs gk, again it is Chalobah fault. That is 51 min and you are 1-0 up, taking a red is not a bad idea.

Edited September 28, 2025Sep 28 by Bob stark

7 minutes ago, Bob stark said:

Worse than Sanchez? 😂😂😂

Yup. Sanchez knew the united player would score, open goal. Trev still had Sanchez back who could have saved it.

1 minute ago, axman2526 said:

Yup. Sanchez knew the united player would score, open goal. Trev still had Sanchez back who could have saved it.

Every manager will take 1-0 down in 3 min over red card. You don't even have to think about this.

Now if you are 1-0 up at 50th min. That is whole another story.

Edited September 28, 2025Sep 28 by Bob stark

10 minutes ago, Bob stark said:

Every manager will take 1-0 down in 3 min over red card. You don't even have to think about this.

Now if you are 1-0 up at 50th min. That is whole another story.

1-1 with 11 vs 11 every time at that time, still loads of the game left

The missing picture can be found on the cover of his next book:

Enzo Maresca: Another way of Losing - The Biography

8 hours ago, axman2526 said:

1-1 with 11 vs 11 every time at that time, still loads of the game left

You can have good argument either way. It is very different to Sanchez where it is easy decision.

Btw all of this is easy for us to say, that is not what the decision that the player think at that time. Can you get or nick the ball is the decision.

Edited September 28, 2025Sep 28 by Bob stark

Thought the startling line up yesterday was good. No complaints there.

Was impressed with the positive start. Controlled the first half well but the same problems continue to exist. Even when dominating the ball game, everything just seems too slow.

When I watch Arsenal, I see them control the game and play much higher up the pitch than we do, you can feel the goal coming. With us, you question how we are going to unlock the opponent when the ball is closer to our keeper than our striker.

The Gusto pass back when having clear open space told me all I need about the mentality being instilled into these players. The manager is a coward.

It is really concerning, how easily we let our guard down when we go to 10 men. This is where the lack of leadership and experience is shown. The team just loses their heads. Chalobah should have just let him go as there is no guarantee the player scores on a one on one and even if, I prefer they score and we have 11 men rather than have a man less and defend a lead with a man disadvantage for 30 mins. Concerning, but not going to jump the gun yet, as the last 2 games, the game has been taken out of our hands with silly decisions from keeper and defender. We looked good up until Chalobah got sent off. Liverpool are top of the league, but I think we can take something if we keep 11 men on the pitch!! Big game against Benfica first on Tuesday. Team needs a reaction. So frustrating the way we have thrown the last 2 league games away. Part and parcel of being a Chelsea fan I guess.

Edited September 28, 2025Sep 28 by STATS

No way Trev should have let his man go with Sanchez in goal (Santos should not have brought Trev into this position to begin with of course). The referee didn't immediately see it as a foul and the amount of time the VAR review took shows he still wasn't convinced. This could have gone the other way. The only one to blame is Maresca, he has zero clue if things don't go to his limited game plan. It doesn't help having mostly young players on the pitch who don't have the experience how to re-organise themselves against a team that they had been dominating all along. Any decent, balanced, well-coached team would have seen this match out pretty comfortably.

Also, there's the usual worry that we just don't take our chances and turn dominence into goals.

Caicedo could be getting a ban if so he will be out of the Liverpool game..brain dead💀

6 hours ago, STATS said:

It is really concerning, how easily we let our guard down when we go to 10 men. This is where the lack of leadership and experience is shown. The team just loses their heads. Chalobah should have just let him go as there is no guarantee the player scores on a one on one and even if, I prefer they score and we have 11 men rather than have a man less and defend a lead with a man disadvantage for 30 mins. Concerning, but not going to jump the gun yet, as the last 2 games, the game has been taken out of our hands with silly decisions from keeper and defender. We looked good up until Chalobah got sent off. Liverpool are top of the league, but I think we can take something if we keep 11 men on the pitch!! Big game against Benfica first on Tuesday. Team needs a reaction. So frustrating the way we have thrown the last 2 league games away. Part and parcel of being a Chelsea fan I guess.

Chalobah is 26 years old. He should be experienced enough not to make such a stupid error. Same for Sanchez

There were a number of points in this game and the Man Utd that are small details but can be so massively important.

We can talk about formations, pattern, system, and we can also talk about the main sendings off, but progress is made by small incremental steps and confidence is eroded on the same basis. It's the small details that matter.

From the Man Utd game of course the sending off was pivital, as was Maresca's massively sh*tting himself overreaction. A major concern for me was the second goal that James shanked up in the air. Watch the replay. Watch Fofana's lack of awarenes and bottling out of dealing with the danger.

Then yesterday, Santos makes a mistake leading to Trev's sending off. But look at the sloppy poor pass from Chalobah to start with, to Santos' wrong foot when he wasn't expecting the ball. So much so he then goes with his right foot rather than taking it on the left, heavy touch and the rest is history.

The kick to the head by Gusto that he gets away with. Gusto yet again was appalling yesterday. But that occurred from a flick on by an unmarked Brighton player, Gruda I think, in the cetre of our goal whilst Hato is stood behind watching.

The first goal is yet again poor marking on Welbeck and our inability or lack of desire to prevent crosses coming in to the box. But the second goal is a shocker. It is clearly a tactic for us to allow overloads at the far post because we have seen us adopt a rugby style line out approach to a defensive line before. So if they have three players unmarked beyond the far post, then that's fine because we will outnumber them for the second ball right. Wrong. They still have two unmarked players in on goal for the second ball. Watch Badiashile's role in that goal. Fck me.

Josh Acheampong, I think, is a great prospect for us. Whilst being a CB, most of his development games were also as a RB and clearly some of that is in his DNA. Whilst ultimately not punished, why is the young, inexperienced CB, dribbling past two or three players whilst they are closing in on him when he is last man. Why are we taking these risks.

it's an old adage but it's true. Players need to do 1 1/2 jobs each. They should always be aware of danger. Caicedo is the only player that we have that has this mindset. So if a player coming out of defence does get caught in possession we would be fcked. It's a sh*t attitude and lack of structure that must come from the coaching staff. Our lack of spatial awareness is staggering. Amateurish.

So my point is, who is responsible for the details. Who does our defensive structure. Our defensive pattern. Why is it not one single player, regardless of height, is able to head the ball. Why is every cross delivered in against us from the wings. Why is there complete panic and disarray whenever a ball is delivered into our box.

I'm still Maresca out, because this blokes tactics and style of football is horrendous. But if he does survive this whoever is the defensive coach needs sacking immediately.

5 hours ago, Caps_Lock_King said:

Caicedo could be getting a ban if so he will be out of the Liverpool game..brain dead💀

What did he even do? Slap the Brighton players hand off his arm? Seems like a load of nothing to me.

Edited September 28, 2025Sep 28 by Scott Harris