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| Shakhtar 2 – 1 Chelsea : Tactical Analysis |
Chelsea were in a roll as they entered he Donbass Arena. They are comfortably atop the English Premier League table after a convincing 4-2 win at White Hart Lane.
After going down in the first 5 minutes, Chelsea failed to grab their chances. When Shakthar scored against them in the second half, it all looked over for Chelsea. Oscar scored in the dying minutes to make the score line look less embarrassing.
Tactically, Shakhtar deserved 3 points. If it was not for Cech, the scoreline would easily have been more embarrassing. The transition of attack from defense is very poor for Chelsea whereas the Ukrainians were brilliant at it. The game had a lot of pace with Shakhtar combining very well upfront.
The combination of Oscar, Mata and Hazard (who came on for Lampard) left way too much space behind them as they went galloping forward.
This was Shakhtar’s overall movement –
Note – I didn’t show the movements of Chelsea as they were the same as the game against Tottenham. Plus I have included Eden Hazard who had more game time after coming on for Frank.
Oscar was assigned the task of closing in on Buschman and Fernandinho. Buschman cleverly stayed back. Mkhitarayan was expected to cover for Ramires but he opted to stay out in attack. This gave him the chance of dragging Terry out of the way. With Terry gone, Teixeira , Adriano and Willian piled on the pressure on the back 4 very quickly.
Srna was also very attackive, which forced Cole to not putting in a single cross. Hazard who came on for Lampard was working hard to get away from the right-back.
They key battle was in the center, where Fernandinho came out on top against Oscar, Mikel and Ramires. His effectiveness in transitioning plays was pivotal in their success. The game was very open and Chelsea will have to make some amends.
Cahill and Terry have to start in European games. Luiz looked off-beat in Ukraine and this can be very negative for the rich vein of form the team is in at the moment.
Torres had an okay game for me. He did well in drifting to the flanks and in the center as instructed by Di Matteo. But when on the ball, he was very poor.
Shakhtar are a hard team to analyze and you could say that they are exactly like Chelsea. Nordjaelland have held Juventus to draw, which is very good news for the blue boys from West London. This also means that Chelsea will have to win their next two European games out of three.
Come on Chelsea ! Carefree since 1905.
Sherry Philips (@bluebloodSherry), Deputy Editor
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