- They did not struggle. Again, they 'failed' due to a fluke, the plan worked. You can defend well and still lose 3-0 if three absolute worldies go in, the success of the plan is not dependent on the scoreline.
Who? The Dippers? ......."Worked"? .......Didn't "Struggle"?
EH? ........They ultimately
failed (no dis-credit to them).
What it showed is that even if you defend "well" and with more solid personnel (and an extra proper CB!!!) it still may not prove enough.
The rag-tag backline was working ok.
Yes it was.... Ironically; the way we were playing (i.e.
with the high line!)....
(You're inadvertently conceding to part of the logic here!)
Vic was sweeping like a maniac and we were creating our own GOOD chances.
(FFS; weren't you - and others contesting - excited? ..... Even when the game went into ET we were punching? .....I swear some of you are so close to hankering for Conte-ball.)
The remainder of my argument here is comes back to the fact that, as we saw with Conte; sitting back; those players had proven to crumble in FAR easier situ's than that (i.e. full 11 and not a crazy-ass, hate-ridden derby!).
Parking the bus instead of continuing what you yourself admit was working doesn't make a great deal of sense given what we know about these defenders.
....As freakish and unfamiliar as it felt; we came so close to pulling it off and (personally) I wouldn't change a thing.
Chavs had the ball in the net three times by attacking the space in behind, they had little to no creativity. When we went down to 9 their entire plan was to play in to said space and it was hilarious how many chances Jackson had.
Again; by the 2nd yellow you (not Ange, but Deuters) would have been placing all your chips on the extremely remote possibility of the numbers game not killing us over 30+ more minutes..... Even though (as per the Liverpool analogy) we didn't have Van Dyke, Matip & Konate, but the aforementioned cut-n-shut flakey back 4.
I agree with the gamble in terms of what it represents. Ange is obviously not a gung-ho idiot. But playing the high-line with zero press was confusing and left us exposed every 2 minutes. Chelsea's incompetency is the only reason they didn't score another 3 or 4 at least.
Who's to say that Ange wouldn't have shut up shop if at 75mins if we were already at 3-1 or 4-1? It's quite likely we would as again; he's no mug... However given the nature and time of those 2 late goals; who gives a fuck?
Gutsy as fuck? Yep.
Wrong call? Nope... Not IMO.