Chelsea 7-2 Sunderland…Stuffed!

What an awful performance!

Our players looked as though they’d accidentally wandered onto a park field, having randomly met up without any prior knowledge of one another. And decided to have a gentle kick about. After a night on the lash.

Yeah…ok, it was Chelsea! But there really aren’t any excuses for such a poor display. The Sunderland “players” showed no heart and no desire to make an impact on the game whatsoever. From the outside, it looked as though they’d quietly agreed that they had no chance of getting anything out of the game and settled to put in the bare minimum needed to just get by. The basics like passing to a man two yards away they struggled to do and even running looked like it was a new fad they’d never seen before.

Chelsea swept us aside as if they were playing a friendly against a non-league side made up of trialists. We didn’t show up and yet again it’s a game that has highlighted so many flaws in our play. We find it difficult to change things around when we’re on the defensive. And we quite simply don’t have the players to play on the counter-attack as our counter-attacks somehow develop into a counter-attack for the opposition.

We have been hit by injuries and suspensions but they only outline the inadequacy of our squad. It is too small and we severely lack any sort of quality in depth. Further investment is a must but after splashing the cash over the past two seasons we still need at least four more first team-players. Our wingers are ineffective, we don’t score enough from midfield and the defence at the moment is a shambles.

It was 4-0 to Chelsea at half-time. If the game had finished 15-2 I don’t think we could have argued. By the end Anelka and Lampard had scored two, Cole, Ballack and Malouda were on the score sheet as well. Bent and Zenden both scored consolation goals.

We can only hope Bruce gets a few players in before the deadline closes.

Roll on next week…and the FA Cup.