McFarlane blames 'really disappointing' defenders for goals conceded against Forest

Calum McFarlane spoke about Chelsea’s defeat to Nottingham Forest with the same glum expression as his precedessors.

Calum McFarlane’s press conference as Chelsea boss was as downbeat as you’d expect.

His first game as a coach at Stamford Bride saw his side blown away by a rotated Nottingham Forest team, with boos at half time and full time. He gave a little more detail about where it had all fallen apart:

“I thought the first 15 minutes we were nowhere near the level we needed to be,” the manager said.

“I thought the early goal was a bit of a sucker punch and we didn’t seem to really recover from that moment. It was a 3v1 at the back post. We know that they like to cross to the back post. We know that the No.9 likes to peel to the back post and we should defend that moment better. It’s really disappointing.”

McFarlane admits defenders let him down

There’s no doubt, the defending wasn’t good enough in that moment. All too often we’ve been let down by defenders’ individual efforts, and then the whole team fails to have the spirit to lift themselves once they concede.

Joao Pedro also spoke after the game, and had little he could say about why the team were so poor.

On Sky Sports, Jamie Carragher laid into the Chelsea project as a whole but said it was “good for football.”