Midfield has been our weakest point in years. When we have somebody decent they are let go - Watson, Bannan amngst others. Until we have a decent holding midfielder working in conjunction with mobile forwards we will struggle. Gallagher should help but he is not the Messiah .....
as for our keeper, like others he has his weaknesses and maybe he should alternate with Buckland ?

I have not noticed anyone suggesting that the John Moss was the best for Chelsea!

As the biased commentator said Rudiger is an expert at fouling and making it look fair, probably on a par with Grealish and Ward-Prowse and as usual the referees are not good enough to call it. The majority of fouls in the first half were in Chelseas favour and having seen the Mitchell 'foul' that lead to the first goal, how does contact between the outside of his foot and the outside of Mounts foot whilst both are on the ground knock the player over holding his shin! If anything Mount stood on Mitchells foot.

Comments have been made that Luka would have been stronger but I suspect that if so he would have seen Red from Mr Moss.

Premier league referees are simply not good enough and the Premier League are not strong enough to stamp out the cheating.

I asserted before the game we basically had the same players as last season.

I was certainly not confident that we could get a result, but losing 3-0 on the back of a less than inspiring performance was disappointing as far as I am concerned.

Mr Hodgson would have come in for some criticism had he been in charge, certainly he would have been pilloried for selecting Mateta over Benteke.

I think VG has probably been our best keeper of recent seasons BUT who came up with this 'rule' that if you drop a keeper it 'destroys' their confidence ?
There is no point having a decent no.2 keeper if you are not prepared to give him a chance whenever the no.1 has a below par game which VG certainly had yesterday. Early on he punched a ball out for a corner when it would have been easier to just catch it. He tamely pushed it away for the 2nd goal when again any top keeper would have held it. Keepers these days seem to prefer wearing big thick gloves to 'get something on it' rather than wearing gloves that actually let you handle the ball. I'd be fair to Butland and start him v Brentford and let VG earn his spot back.

Guaita has never been that commanding when the ball is in the air and his strengths lie in his shot-stopping ability.
I suspect he will be disappointed in his part in the second goal.

Probably longer. The league tends not to settle until the clocks change and that is how long it will take (at least) for the new breed to bed in.