Paul Scholes has singled out Chelsea’s defenders as weak links in Frank Lampard’s Blues squad after their weekend defeat to Manchester City.
Despite clearly making a lot of progress under Lampard this season, Chelsea’s youthful side has tended to come up short in the big games so far.
The west Londoners were thrashed 4-0 by Manchester United on the opening day of the season and have also lost now to Liverpool and City, albeit more narrowly.
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Scholes, however, thinks these defeats against the big teams show that Lampard has problems at Stamford Bridge, and he singled out the two centre-backs, Fikayo Tomori and Kurt Zouma, as not being ideal for the way the manager wants his side to play.
“He’s definitely missing something. He went to Manchester United, everyone said Chelsea were the best team, played really well, got beat 4-0,” Scholes is quoted by the Metro.
“Played against Liverpool, played okay I don’t think they were anything great against Liverpool, got beat.
“Played against Manchester City, everyone’s saying the best team, they were really good, they played well, they’ve lost the game. Now he has to find a way of changing that.
“I’d be a little bit worried about his two centre-halves, the way he wants to play are they good enough on the ball?
“I think defensively they’re okay but they look a bit nervous on the ball to me, which can create nerves throughout the team.”
This seems a little harsh on the pair as they’ve largely done well in most games, but perhaps they are just short of being good enough in key moments against higher calibre opposition.
Scholes also commented on that need to replace Eden Hazard in attack, which of course was made even harder due to the club’s transfer ban over the summer.
He added: “Are they a centre-forward short? We know they’re missing Eden Hazard from last year, who’s a big difference we know that, he’s got the quality in these big games to win them.
“[Lampard’s] got a really good team, but he’s got to find that way of winning in big games, and that will frustrate him for now.”