The fear was always that this would be a massive letdown after the Barcelona and Arsenal games last week, and unfortunately that’s precisely how things panned out at Elland Road, an unhappy hunting grounds even in the best of times.
Chelsea were off the pace from the opening whistle, and none of Enzo Maresca’s rotational choices seemed to be working. It may have taken a set piece goal and a long-range bomb — not exactly high-xG situations — but Leeds deserved their 2-0 half-time lead.
A couple half-time substitutions injected some life into the team, and Pedro Neto got one back just a few minutes into the second period. But we couldn’t quite build on that, with Leeds, buoyed by the raucous home crowd, were more than a match to it … and had the ball in the back of the net again, only to see it ruled out for an offside.
Palmer arrived on the hour-mark but could not prove the difference-maker on his return from a two-month absence. Instead, it was his good buddy Tosin who did, but unfortunately not in the positive sense, gifting Leeds their third with 75 minutes on the clock.
It wasn’t his day, or ours.
* It remains a massive problem that there’s such big dropoffs from the first-choice lineups; we can’t play same 11-12 players every time, we have to be able to rotate and not just for cupcakes, if we want to compete across multiple competitions
* Our record at Elland Road now stands at just 6 wins in 49 league visits
* Chelsea down to fourth
* Next up: Bournemouth away, on Saturday
* KTBFFH
See More:
* [Chelsea FC: Premier League](/premier-league)