Promoted Bournemouth won 1-0 at Stamford Bridge with an 82nd-minute goal from Glenn Murray.
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Chelsea, who are already out of the League Cup, will have to at least draw their next Champions League game against FC Porto on Wednesday to be sure of progressing in the tournament.
José Mourinho says that Chelsea’s midweek Champions League clash with Porto is basically a “knockout game”, as per Chelsea TV (via the Daily Mail). We scored one goal to win the game against Norwich.
This season’s Premier League, by contrast, is a more manageable climb.
The same fate befell them in 2012-13, when the team went on to win the Europa League under interim manager Rafael Benitez. “They were more than ready for basketball and they did it very well”.
Mourinho was left bemoaning the referee’s decision not to award a penalty before Bournemouth’s goal when Simon Francis handled, although he did acknowledge some of Chelsea’s shortcomings.
The Sunday Supplement panel discuss whether time has run out for Jose Mourinho, or will Chelsea stick with him a bit longer? There would be some serious reinforcements coming through the door.
Chelsea’s defeat put Manchester United’s frustrations into perspective. You can not behave like that, I don’t care who you are, it’s so disrespectful to the manager and it sets the wrong example to all those players on the bench. Plus, with teams all beating each other, the required points total is likely to be lower than normal.
Chelsea could boost their January funds by selling Juan Cuadrado to Juventus in a permanent £16m deal and create space on the wage bill by allowing Radamel Falcao to cut short his loan spell if an interested club can be found.
“Our objective is not to fight for (avoiding) relegation, so if our objective is to fight for top four then (after this) you have to think about finishing top six”.
The Blues’ nightmare title defence reached its nadir on Saturday.
“I am concerned obviously”.
Mourinho had previously insisted that his men were still capable of breaking into the top four.
After eight defeats, four of them at home, Chelsea are 14 points adrift of that target, four months into the season.
There was only one negative for Leicester. Jamie Vardy last weekend broke a Premier League record by scoring in his 11th consecutive match, but the striker missed out on equaling the all-time pre-1992 topflight mark of 12 games. Genoa is 15th on 16 points. Their prospects are the equivalent of West Brom recovering from a shaky start to claim a commendable mid-table berth.
Darren Lewis of the Mirror reported owner Roman Abramovich and the board have become “increasingly worried” by Chelsea’s set of results, and even a positive outcome against Porto in the Champions League is “unlikely to affect their thinking” regarding the retention of the Special One. The Blues therefore require an improbable average of 2.5 points per game from their remaining 23 fixtures to reach this mark.
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Mourinho also suggested that Bournemouth had indulged in time-wasting.
