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Frank Lampard with ominous message for Steve Bruce and Newcastle United

3 years ago
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Frank Lampard was obviously pleased with the three points on Saturday.

A win, a clean sheet, all achieved away from home and coming off an international break where Chelsea had a host of players travelling around the world to play for their countries.

However, reading these quotes from Frank Lampard below after the match, should be setting the alarm bells going for Steve Bruce, his players and all Newcastle fans.

Chelsea totally dominated the game, had 71% possession overall, 79% in the first half!

Effectively had the game won after only 10 minutes when they scored, with Karl Darlow having already had to make two excellent saves before the opening goal came.

Only due to wasting chance after chance and not making the most of other great attacking situations, did Chelsea not win by five or six.

Despite this, Frank Lampard declared after the match: ‘We played well in patches…’

If that isn’t ominous for Newcastle United then I don’t know what is, especially when it took until the 79th minute for NUFC to have their one and only effort on target in the whole game, Miguel Almiron forcing the save after being left out by Steve Bruce and coming off the bench late on.

It has to be an even bigger worry when after the match Steve Bruce claimed Newcastle had done ok and had some good moments in the match, good spells, even claiming that Joelinton had played well, the Brazilian making it now two goals in 46 Premier League appearances.

As Frank Lampard also indicates, any positive moments that Newcastle United did have, pretty much all came from Chelsea thinking it was so easy and gifting possession a number of times when under zero pressure.

Frank Lampard leaving feeling a bit disappointed I think, despite the three points and easy win, whilst Steve Bruce claiming a number of positives from this latest ultra negative tactics shambles, woeful in terms of both entertainment and the end result.

Frank Lampard speaking to the official club site:

“It’s always smoother on the bench for me and the staff when you do wrap it up early, but it [not getting the second goal and sealing the win when so much on top] can happen.

Frank Laand the result is key in these games because the Premier League is tough.

“It’s relentless and after the break where we were playing well and everyone goes in their own directions and comes back. I thought the lads dealt with the challenge of the game very well today, so I’m very pleased.’

“It was great to get the early goal, that changes the aspect of it, but the second one was then so important and we obviously had chances to get that earlier.

“Even after that we could maybe score again but we can’t have it all our own way.

“There are days where you aren’t quite at it in front of goal, then we put the game away very well I thought in our professional performance.

“It’s important for us as a group if we want to get where we want to be that you have to work on those moments when you do go ahead that you don’t get complacent.

“Penetration was the big thing for me. We were having control but people were still happy to run in.

“It’s very easy to think “I’ll come short to the ball” or “I’ll play the safe pass”. We had to keep making those more dangerous passes and the runs and the effort to get in there, and I think to a degree we did.

“It’s not an easy game, I can understand the players can sometimes become comfortable. It’s little lessons where we can get better.

“I thought the first 20 minutes we were great because we had control and we had penetration. We had people running in behind, we were getting in sight and making crosses. I think sometimes the danger of that sort of control is it becomes comfort, which is dangerous and we then turned it over a couple of times.

“So that was the message at half-time. They came out more positive in the second half and I always felt the real danger moments for us could be on transition and counter-attack, because Timo showed that two or three times in the first half and then obviously he shows that for Tammy’s goal.”

Stats from BBC Sport:

Newcastle 0 Chelsea 2 – Saturday 21 November 12.30pm

Goals:

Newcastle:

Chelsea:

Fernandez OG 10, Abraham 65

(Half-time stats in brackets)

Possession was Chelsea 71% (79%) Newcastle 29% (21%)

Total shots were Chelsea 14 (8) Newcastle 8 (3)

Shots on target were Chelsea 3 (2) Newcastle 1 (0)

Corners were Chelsea 4 (2) Newcastle 7 (3)

Referee: Craig Pawson

Newcastle United:

Darlow, Manquillo (Almiron 65), Lascelles (Schar 45), Fernandez, Clark, Lewis, Hayden, Sean Longstaff, Murphy, Saint-Maximin (Carroll 74), Joelinton

Unused Subs:

Gillespie, Shelvey, Hendrick, Krafth

Crowd: 00,000

(Steve Bruce reaction to fans after Newcastle 0 Chelsea 2 “There will always be grumbles” – Read HERE)

(These BBC Sport comments about Newcastle 0 Chelsea 2 perfectly sum up Steve Bruce – Read HERE)

(Newcastle 0 Chelsea 2 – Match ratings and comments on all the NUFC players – Read HERE)

(Newcastle 0 Chelsea 2 – Instant NUFC fan/writer reaction to Saturday’s defeat – Read HERE)

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