Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
THINGS WE LEARNT
NO Championship club has seen more red cards this season than Wigan.
Defender Danny Fox became their sixth in the 0-0 stalemate at Barnsley on Saturday.
Fox was sent off in the 71st minute – getting a straight red for a high tackle on Elliot Simoes.
IT was one of the eye-catching Championship results of the weekend: QPR 0 Sheffield Wednesday 3. And with it came an unwanted record for the west London side because QPR have now let in 39 league goals at home this season, the most they have conceded at home in a single campaign in their league history.
involved to get through this season. Then we’ll look forward.”
Limping to a bloodletting at the end of a campaign which for so long promised Champions League football is not how Lampard envisaged things panning out.
But a defence which has conceded 49 goals – more than any other top-10 side and one which was bullied mercilessly by Wilder’s muscular – is clearly not fit for the purpose which Lampard intends.
Andreas Christensen, Antonio Rudiger and Kurt Zouma will all be feeling the heat. “If you want to be a Chelsea player and fight for the Premier League, fight in Europe, and fight for trophies, you have to focus on yourself,” said Lampard. “We were 30-odd points off the top two last season. If you want that gap to close, you have to focus on
CHELSEA 49
yourself. If players come in, that should be the nature of the beast playing for Chelsea. It shouldn’t be a problem for anyone.”
Lampard, who started with a back four and shifted to a back three with no noticeable improvement in the second half, will have looked on enviously at Wilder’s ferociously disciplined and well-organised defensive trio.
There was mitigation only in that they were two down at the break and stretched themselves in order to regain a footside