How dare you develop any sense of optimism as a Chelsea fan this season! Feel good wins are but a commodity in this new era.

Not even against the lowest of oppositions could we enjoy some tactful, driven, and sound football.

Sheffield United have lost 21 of their 31 games in the Premier League this season, have conceded an average of 2.

6 goals per game (82 total), and have scored an average of 0.

96 goals per game (30 total).

In their 10 previous matches they had won just once, conceding 34 goals in the meantime and scoring just 13.

In their 15 home matches prior to kickoff, they'd shipped 45 goals, only one less than the record (Watford in 2021-22) - and they would become the worst ever by the final whistle.

They are historically bad, and we managed to draw against such opposition.

Starting XIs Soccerway Half of this game was played in the middle third of the pitch, and unsurprisingly the midfield played a huge role in that.

Unfortunately for us, our midfield trio have each played around 50 hours of football already this season, and only Axel Disasi has more.

Fernandez and Caicedo have been noticably fatigued, but, as mentioned in my last article, their intended relief/replacements are injuried.

Managing this squad's injuries has surely been difficult, but being overly-reliant on that duo in particular is bringing some unnecessary scrutiny to their cost effectiveness.

Given that he has now either assisted or scored the winning or equalising goal 18 times now this season, Cole Palmer was licensed as a left-sided no.

10 with license to drift, meant to open up the right-winger position and complement Noni Madueke after making some impactful substitute appearances.

This also meant that, in order to provide a semblance of balance, Conor Gallagher and Marc Cucurella were the attacking thrust down our left, though were hardly threatening.

Axel Disasi was not expected to provide nearly the same sort of offensive contribution on the right as Cucurella and, via the average player positions and how incredibly predictable our passing patterns became based on those positions, it becomes more clear why we could hardly manage to generate genuine chances.

Madueke was often on or near the touchline while Palmer occupied the half-space on the right, closer to his preferred position than a traditional no.

10, and it was quite clear that our attack was going to focus on that flank.

Considering how asymmetrical we are beneath, it shouldn't come as a surprise that the left only saw 27% of the attack while the right saw 47%.

With such clear intentions, we were more easily defended.

Moving Palmer minimised his, Gallagher's, and indeed our entire left-side's play.

It also made our left easier targets for a counter when they did in fact attack and push on down that side, which is were 42% of their attack stemmed.

Notice how their average positions essentially counterbalance ours.

Passing networks, average player positions, xT per pass, et al.

McLachBot Sheffield United had a unique and effective way of halting our forward progress, and metrics confirm as much.

The average height of their defensive actions was about 47 metres, essentially just shy of the midfield line, but their PPDA was very high, 18.

2 meaning they allowed us to pass until we entered certain areas of the pitch.

In fact, they were even slow to react to our progression on the wings until a run or pass became more threatening centrally, which is why they allowed so many passes per defensive action (18.

2) but seemed to press so heavily.

They could care less how much we passed it across our backline or made a somewhat penetrating pass only for it to be played straight back to the defense.

Their defensive 5-3-2 shape Our six attempted shots (3 on target) are the fewest Sheffield have faced in the league this year, and by 4 attempts at that.

It would be poignant to again mention that Sheffield are a team on record for historical lows this season.

We offered so little going forward that our xG was a mere 0.

37, and we had a hard time even getting into their box to take chances - 3 of our 6 shots were from outside their box and we only had 14 entries into their box from open play.

Contrast that to the fact that 8 of their 11 shots were from inside the box, 6 were on target, and that they were able to generate better chances and accumulate 1.

36 xG.

Much of their play funnelled through Oliver Arblaster, and he was remarkably effective because he was lacking proper marking - something that Gallagher would normally have done in that position.

Arblaster was successful on 44/52 passes at 84.

6%, 8 of which were progressive, made 41 carries, and accumulated 427 metres of progressive passing/carries in total, by far the most of any of their outfielders and better than all of our field players with the exception of the three fielded centrebacks.

They also grew into the game, both after Thiago Silva scored and Madueke's go-ahead goal.

That said, on Silva's goal, we ourselves employed some good blocking, just like what had been done a few times to us (see: Dara O'Shea or Virgil Van Dijk.

) It's good to see us not only learning from (some of) our mistakes but turning a weakness into a strength.

And we haven't even yet gotten Bernardo Cueva working on our set pieces yet! That man has his work cut out for him defensively.

.

.

New kids using the block In the first half, 66% of our passes (247/376) were in our own half - that grew in the second half to 71% (157/222), and without really pushing forward well and playing more in our half, their threat grew ever more as the second half wore on.

And if ever there was some game mismanagement, it was in this second half - and it falls largely on the shoulders of Pochettino.

His decision to move Palmer had already backfired, and while the substitutions of Carney Chukwuemeka and Mikhailo Mudryk cannot be criticised too heavily, the additions of Benoit Badiashile and Cesare Casadei can be.

I am sure they were added to bring height to the back line, but having a better organised line would have solved the issue outright, and bringing on players who haven't kicked a ball in the dying embers of the game and no less to defend a free kick historically comes back to haunt a team.

With Thiago Silva still in the game and for all his defesive acumen, not to mention 3 other centrebacks (Disasi, Badiashile, and Chalobah) on the pitch, the disarray seen below in both circumstances, the initial dead ball and the second one into the box, is inexcusable.

Zig-zag back line There is still much to improve and much to learn about a squad that has, without a doubt, not yet fielded its strongest possible XI (disregarding injuries) this season - but the expected achievement of progress is hard to see.

While we have certainly improved in offense and are scoring more than earlier this season (or last season, for that matter), our defense is already worse than it was last year with 8 games remaining.

Antonio Conte had some famous first words to his players upon joining Juventus in 2011, and I think they're appropriately reapplied here.

.

.

"Lads, it's time we stopped being sh*t.

".