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Monday, June 11, 2012

Concentration could cost us 4th place

Concentration was one of Mourinho's biggest concerns when he was Chelsea manager, his back room staff would watch the players during warm-ups and if anybody looked like they weren't paying full attention, Mourinho would be told and he would put things right.

Concentration is also something which could cost Chelsea as they look to get into the top four and qualify for next season's Champions League, so far, late goals have only stopped them winning once, on Monday night against Fulham. However, if that late goal hadn't gone in, Chelsea would be 4th place right now, not sixth.

It's an impressive stat for stand in boss Roberto Di Matteo that his Chelsea team haven't conceded once in the first half. Not quite as impressive is the 10 goals his team have conceded in the second half of games, nearly costing them on several occasions.



Some blame the fitness of players, John Terry playing through the pain and lack of breathing with two cracked ribs, and the vast amounts of games the club is being made to play in a short number of days, however, they should be able to keep concentration for the full 90 minutes. It should have been spotted that Terry had a man blocking him so Dempsey could get a free header but it wasn't, Mikel ended up helping Fulham by marking his man and blocking Terry at the same time.

A strong defence has been the foundations on which Mourinho won back to back titles conceding just 37 goals in two years, that's six less than this year. We had rode our luck and gotten away with it until Monday night, and hopefully that will be the wake up call for Di Matteo and the defence.

Up The Chels!

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