Chelsea’s scary stats with and without injured star show bigger problem than Alonso

Chelsea are desperately missing Joao Pedro, and don’t have anyone remotely close to good enough to replace him in the team.

Chelsea striker Joao Pedro has been out injured since before the Tottenham game, and the team haven’t looked the same without him.

We all knew how vital he was to the way the team plays, but even then we didn’t imagine that things could get quite this bad without him.

Part of the problem is that his replacements just don’t come close to his level. That’s what Simon Johnson wrote about in his summary of yesterday’s defeat to Sunderland.

Johnson points out that three of Chelsea’s four league defeats this season have been without JP. He has five goals and three assists in his six league starts.

He’s not only in great form himself, he also makes Morgan Rogers and Cole Palmer look so much better when he’s playing. Just compare their totally ineffective efforts yesterday to the slick football we played when they were all starting together.

By scoring 20 goals in all competitions last season, he joined just 10 other players to have done so for the Blues in the Premier League era.

Xabi Alonso made an interesting sub against Sunderland and explained it to Chelsea TV after the game.

Chelsea were very poor in the game, without doubt, but part of their issue came from some very questionable decisions around one penalty given and another not given.

Alonso was asked about his team’s attempts to score, and he admitted they simply hadn’t been good enough in attack.