Chelsea FC narrowly avoided their fourth defeat of the season with a late comeback against Newcastle United on Saturday. Goals from two relatively unexpected sources in Ramires and Willian brought the Blues back from going down by two goals against a Magpies side that has yet to win in the the league this season.
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The Blues were toothless in attack and approached the match without the urgency they showed against Maccabi Tel Aviv or Arsenal last weekend. Sky Sports’ Jamie Redknapp believes that it was a lack of striking options that hurt the Blues against Newcastle and made them look so listless going forward.
Redknapp said in his post-match comments for Sky:
"“If you’re going to miss a player that much, you need to have something to come in and do the job that he does. So I think that Jose Mourinho has to accept responsibility for not bringing in someone who can do that job. I think the decision to sign Falcao, as much as Falcao was an unbelievable player a couple of years ago, you can see he’s not at that level anymore.”Source: Sky Sports"
The former Liverpool midfielder went on to elaborate on his point, saying that Mourinho should have known that Costa would miss time through suspension and should have brought in another striker. While it was not the reason why Chelsea looked downright awful against Newcastle, there is a great deal of truth to Redknapp’s comments.
Chelsea were linked to Belgium striker Christian Benteke this summer but he joined Liverpool after the Reds met his £32.5m release clause. The Blues instead brought in Radamel Falcao who is a shadow of his former self as we have seen in performances with Manchester United last year and with Chelsea this season.
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Benteke is a similar player to Costa in that he is a physical player who occasionally shows flashes of technical brilliance. He has a penchant of scoring spectacular goals and is nowhere near the wind-up merchant that Costa is so suspensions are uncommon for the striker. The former Aston Villa man would have been the perfect replacement for Costa and would have given Chelsea a chance to rotate the strikers without any dropoff in talent.
Loic Remy has been an able deputy since he arrive from Queens Park Rangers but he is a striker that uses pace over physicality the way Costa and Benteke do. There was room on the squad for a striker trio of Benteke, Costa, and Remy but there is little reason to believe that the Belgian would have accepted a backup role with the Blues.
The decision to sign Falcao may have a significant negative impact on the Blues’ season because of his inability to step in as Costa’s deputy, but it was not poor striker play that hurt them against Newcastle. The poor play of some of Chelsea FC’s biggest stars and their lack of urgency is what has been hurting them this season. Eden Hazard, Nemanja Matic, Cesc Fabregas, and Branislav Ivanovic have all been subpar this season and that is an unacceptable number of players who are out of form just a season removed from a dominant title-winning campaign.
As Thierry Henry put it after the Newcastle match, “even if had Diego Costa, Maradona and Pele, the way they played in the first half was shocking”. It was not just the first half against Newcastle that was shocking, but rather the majority of matches the Blues have played this season.
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