What are ya gonna do? When three players of the opposition are worth more than your whole side in transfer fees, a 2-0 loss with only ten men on the pitch has to be considered a valiant effort. I didn't know Chelsea needed an ego boost that bad, but I guess I was wrong.
All our boys need to be commended for their performances. No one was particularly poor, though I thought Crouch missed an opportunity to step up and be a leader. I take that back actually, Xabi was well off his game, but you can't really get too down on him, it was his first match back in two months. Everyone else played at a high level and were tremendous when allowed, especially Sissoko and Itandje.
The ref was clearly duplicitous in his actions. While they were allowed to steamroll over our players, if we accidentally touched one of them, a foul was called. I was surprised they were so fragile and crumpled to the ground so easily being world-class and all. The yellow card on Lucas was especially harsh and the red card against Crouch was a complete joke, but we actually appeared to play better once the lanky one was gone, so I'll leave it at that. Abramovich continued his squeaky-clean record of paying for vacation homes for referees, but I'm a bit surprised he spent his money on a Carling Cup match. He is the billionaire though, so I'm sure he paid some genius to analyze the cost-reward benefits.
If I had to point out a negative though, I would have to say our lack of continuity. While at times, when attempting to control possession while remaining relatively static, we moved the ball around well enough, but when anyone would tried to set-up another player with a through-ball, the majority of anticipatory passes found themselves either in the middle of nowhere or at a Chelsea player's feet. On defense, I was aghast when are uncoordinated ganglia of defenders didn't lead to more goals for Chelsea, but we either recovered in time or the Blues were unable to take advantage. Carra was decidedly awesome, covering for a bewildered Hobbs, who's first trip to Stamford Bridge found him clearly out of his league.
In the end, this is just a League Cup match. The trophy matters less than experience given to players like Babel, Lucas, Hobbs, Itandje, and El Zhar. Chelsea did give Sinclair a run out, but apparently he wasn't up to par, so Joe Cole had to be brought on to give the Blues that much more of an edge... at home. Next up is Portsmouth on Saturday, let's hope all is well with Steven Gerrard by then. Cheers, and I will definitely be doing player ratings for this one, as I feel certain players really stepped up today and need to be credited for doing so.
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