Three excuses for Chelsea’s bad defending just don’t wash

Chelsea have a defensive crisis which now spans several seasons, and no manager or player seems able to solve it.

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International breaks were tough at the best of times – now we've got a three week one, what on earth are we going to talk about? The Athletic have an idea – Simon Johnson has a long piece out about how to fix Chelsea.

Do they need fixing? Xabi Alonso has only just got his feet under the desk, but there are some pretty clear issues.

Chelsea's defensive excuses don't explain years of trouble

Levi Colwill (Photo by Darrian Traynor/Getty Images)

Clearly, improving the defence is priority number one. There's not point scoring if you can't keep a clean sheet, as we've found out in recent weeks. So far, none of Alonso's tinkering has worked. Neither a back four nor a back five has produced results.

Johnson's excuses are that – Emi Martinez and Maxence Lacroix are only just adjusting to the league. Levi Colwill is coming back from a long term injury. And there have been other players missing.

Yet you'd still expect far better, even with all those factors taken into account. We will give it until December for the likes of Lacroix, Colwill and Martinez to get up to speed, but after than we'll be starting to despair.

Emi Martinez has not had a good start to life at Chelsea – but there are some pretty shocking stats which provide him a good excuse for it.