For Mauricio Pochettino, it was just not possible to sell this as a hard luck story. His Chelsea team dominated possession, they played on the front foot and they had plenty of possibilities in their approach play. But there was something missing, there remains something missing in this team that he is trying to shape out of the chaos of the summer transfer window.
Quite simply, it is aggression and conviction – particularly in the final third, when the pressure is really on. It was hard to say that anybody in Chelsea’s colours had played well – apart from maybe the stand-in captain, Conor Gallagher.
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