Chelsea FC twice seemed to have booked passage to the Chelsea FC twice seemed to have booked passage to the
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Chelsea FC Deserved To Be Eliminated, Says Mourinho

By Lou Flavius

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On a night during which Chelsea FC twice seemed to have booked passage to the Champions League quarter-finals, treble hopes came crashing down.

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Paris Saint-Germain — having kept the tie alive through an Edinson Cavani equalizer after Branislav Ivanovic put Chelsea ahead 1-0 during the first leg in France — showed resilience at Stamford Bridge, carving out a victory (so to speak) despite being down a man.

Poor refereeing saw Zlatan Ibrahimovic sent off early in the first half, after engaging in what looked to be a 50-50 challenge with Oscar. The foul merited a yellow at most, but the big Swede was forced to show the game his back.

A few moments later, Chelsea were denied a clear penalty (yet again) when Diego Costa was brought down in the box by Cavani. Had the referee shown an ounce of competence, PSG would have all 11 men on the pitch, and Chelsea would have probably gone ahead much earlier.

The Blues failed to exploit the shorthanded opposition. At times, it even looked like they were the ones playing a man light.

Gary Cahill would open the scoring in the 81st minute, and it looked like the Blues would see the game off comfortably, but as fate would have it, a timely equalizer was scored five minutes later by another player allowed to leave last summer.

David Luiz finally severed Stamford Bridge ties with a heartbreaking header which he celebrated passionately.

The game would go into 30 minutes of extra time as neither side had an advantage. Eden Hazard gave the Blues another lead with a coolly-taken spot kick, but Thiago Silva — who handled the ball in his box to give away the penalty — scored off a header to level scores yet again, knocking Chelsea out of the competition.

Chelsea will have themselves to blame. They had an entire week to prepare, not having played since last Wednesday, but they showed no signs of sharpness.

Ramires’ passing was sloppy, Costa had little impact, while Oscar continued his dull streak.

Nemanja Matic did have a solid game after missing the Blues’ last two matches through suspension, but hobbled off with an injury late on. He was replaced by the able Kurt Zouma, but the Blues conceded shortly after.

Chelsea showed nothing of their early-season swagger. Now that the business end of the season is upon us, they have reverted from the swashbuckling attractive football, to an organized system meant to grind out results the rest of the way.

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I cannot fault them for such an approach; Mourinho has enough winners’ medals to prove how effective the not-so-beautiful game could be, but when presented with a man-advantage, he should go for the jugular.

For most of the game, even after going up 1-0, it was evident that anxiety had taken over Mourinho’s men. While PSG could play their game with no pressure, the Blues saw no end of it, and finally cracked in the end.

Mourinho says that the Parisians deserved to go through, and he will meet with his team to analyze and plot the way forward.

"“Yes (PSG deserved to go through). I want to discuss things with the players tomorrow.”“I want them to see the game in a calm way, I want to know their feelings. We must try to find conclusions about our performance.”-Jose MourinhoSource: Express"

The manager bemoaned having the game snatched away from his team on two occasions, but admitted that Laurent Blanc’s side coped better with the match pressure.

"“It was not good enough. The game was in our hands twice.(Mentally) they were stronger than us.”“They coped better with the pressure of the game. Maybe with 10 men we felt even more pressure to win.”“They had nothing to lose. They were just playing that game. We felt that extra pressure and couldn’t cope.”“We conceded two goals from set pieces. Our performance was not good enough. We conceded two goals that are difficult to accept.”"

Apart from not actually losing, a positive can be taken from this loss — no more distractions.

Chelsea hold a five point lead plus a game in hand over Manchester City in the race for the Premier League title. Now out of the FA Cup and Champions League — having already won the Capital One Cup — they can maintain singular focus.

If by some miracle City get past Barcelona, the Blues could be handed an advantage in the race. But one thing is clear; they cannot afford to slip up anymore.

If by some miracle City get past Barcelona, the Blues could be handed an advantage in the race. But one thing is clear; they cannot afford to slip up anymore.

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