Chelsea manager not happy with performances of trio
Chelsea boss Jose Mourinho has pointed the figure at three of his first-team players following the club’s 2-1 loss to Crystal Palace.
The Blues suffered a shock defeat at Stamford Bridge following a late winner from Joel Ward and after the game, Mourinho was quick to highlight two or three players that didn’t perform for him during the match.
Mourinho admitted that it was his fault for not recognising the players were struggling and not taking them off sooner.
Despite refusing to name the culprits he blamed, one of them is believed to be Branislav Ivanovic, who has had a nightmare start to the new campaign.
The Serbian couldn’t deal with the pace of Palace and struggled time-after-time throughout the afternoon.
However, Mourinho refused to highlight names and just stated that it was two or three players that let him down.
Mourinho Points Finger
‘If a player is not performing there are two ways to look at it.
‘The first one is that I trust the player so much that I will wait for the improvement. You wait, wait, and wait and maybe it comes or it doesn’t come.
‘Or, even when you are trusting the player arrives a moment when you think, “I have to change”. And I can go both ways.
‘I’m not happy with the performance because, for me, a performance is a collective performance, of 11 players at the same time.
‘To perform collectively you need individual performances. When you have these kind of matches at this level you need people to perform.
‘I cannot say I had 11 players at the same time performing. Two or three of them their individual performance was far from good.
‘I blame myself for not changing one of them. When I made the third change I needed a fourth.’
When asked for the identity of that player, Mourinho responded: ‘It’s the last thing I’m going to tell you.’
Written by Alex Batt – @AlexBatt
