“WE didn’t know Real Madrid were that good.”
Those were the words of Frank Lampard after Chelsea’s 2-0 defeat to Los Blancos (14 times European Cup winners, by the way) at the Bernabeu on Wednesday night.
The Blues were outclassed by unknown players such as Karim Benzema, Luka Modric and Vinicius Junior – who experts claim have actually won the Champions League before believe it or not – and they now face an uphill task to make it to the semi-finals of Europe’s premier competition.
Lampard’s questionable comment is indicative of his beloved club’s season as a whole in many ways: disorganised, ill-prepared, frustrating.
Certainly Dream Team gaffers have been persistently annoyed by Chelsea players this term – Stamford Bridge is usually a reliable source of plentiful returns but their assets, particularly the attack-minded ones, have disappointed.
To illustrate the point, we’ve compiled seven damning stats that underline the Blues’ campaign.
1. Just two Chelsea players have reached 100 points
Thiago Silva (£5.7m) can hold his head high as he was permanently among Dream Team’s best defenders before his injury and his tally of 104 points remains the 13th highest among defenders.
Kai Havertz (£3.9m) has mustered 102 points which, while respectable, could actually be seen as below par given the chances he’s squandered in recent months.
And that’s it as far as centurions go for the west London club.
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In contrast, Manchester City have nine players on 100+ points – struggling West Ham have as many centurions as Chelsea at this late stage of the season.
2. Chelsea’s best-performing midfielder is below Morgan Gibbs-White, Fred and Harvey Elliott in the rankings
Raheem Sterling (£4m) is the top performer in his position among his team-mates with 62 points but that total, a far cry from the mammoth returns he registered in a Man City shirt, only puts him 42nd overall among midfielders.
What’s most concerning for the Stamford Bridge faithful is how dramatically the England winger has fallen off as the campaign has progressed.
Sterling racked up 40 of his 62 points by the end of Game Week 8.
3. 17 points is enough to make Enzo Fernandez (£2.8m) Chelsea’s third-best midfielder
To further underline Chelsea’s issues in the middle of the park, the Argentina international, a January signing, is the third-best midfielder in the squad with just 17 points.
Fernandez has been one of his side’s better players since the turn of the year and, in fairness, it’s not his primary role to provide attacking contributions.
Conor Gallagher (£1.5m), Mateo Kovacic (£2m), Ruben Lofus-Cheek (£1.2m), N’Golo Kante (£2.9m), Christian Pulisic (£2m), Hakim Ziyech (£2.2m) and Mykhailo Mudryk (£2.7m) have combined for just 76 points, two fewer than Ivan Perisic (£3.5m) who has hardly lit up the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium.
4. Chelsea’s five forwards combined have just one more point than Ivan Toney (£6.1m) has managed solo
The Blues’ defence has held up fine in general but they’ve desperately struggled to convert possession into goals.
Chelsea’s entire forward line – Havertz, Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang (£3.6m), Joao Felix (£3.6m), Armando Broja (£1.9m), David Fofana (£1.8m) – have mustered 169 points as a collective which is just one more than Brentford’s top scorer has amassed on his own.
Granted, Toney has enjoyed a prosperous campaign but it wasn’t that long ago that having Felix, Aubameyang and Havertz in the same team was purely the stuff of Football Manager fantasy.
5. Mason Mount (£3m) averages fewer points-per-game than Adam Lallana, Vitaly Janelt and Alex Iwobi
Chelsea’s attacking problems can’t be pinned on one man alone but Mount’s severe dip must be noted.
The England midfielder was one of only three men to reach double figures for both goals and assists in the Premier League last season but with just six weeks to go of the 2022/23 campaign he’s registered just three goals and two assists.
The 24-year-old was one of the first names on the team sheet for both club and country not long ago but he’s now being tipped for a transfer and he’s certainly dropped down Gareth Southgate’s pecking order too.
6. Chelsea have scored ten fewer Premier League goals than Leeds and eleven fewer than Leicester this season
This simply underlines the attacking problems further.
Chelsea have conceded fewer league goals than Man United, Spurs and Brighton but their miserly nature in defence has been undermined by wastefulness in the final third.
The extent of this problem is best highlighted by the fact they’re not even in the same bracket as Leeds and Leicester, two relegation candidates, in terms of goals scored.
7. Erling Haaland has scored 36 goals more than Chelsea’s top scorer this season
Most people would have predicted the predatory Norway international would outscore Chelsea’s top scorer but 36 goals is a laughably wide margin.
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Havertz tops the charts at Stamford Bridge with just nine goals in all competitions, not even in the same universe as Haaland’s incredible tally of 45.
In fact, Man City’s No9 has scored 30 league goals, one more than Chelsea’s 29.
Source: Soccer - thesun.co.uk
