Football: RANIERI: I DON'T KNOW WHAT TO DO; Fulham 1 Chelsea - Chelsea boss baffled as his men let another win slip by.
Byline: DAVID McDONNELLCLAUDIO RANIERI was at a loss to explain why his side keep throwing away leads after seeing Chelsea do it for the third time this season.
They were in command of the West London derby against Fulham, but allowed Jean Tigana's side to claw their way back and almost snatch victory.
Ranieri admitted his players need to be more ruthless in killing off opponents if they are to be genuine title contenders.
Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink put Chelsea ahead in the 31st minute, only for Barry Hayles to equalise 10 minutes after half-time.
Chelsea were forced to battle for their point after midfielder Slavisa Jokanovic was sent off 10 minutes from time for a second bookable offence. Ranieri was far from pleased with his side. He said: "We can't maintain concentration long enough. What do I do? I just don't know.
"It's very difficult. We speak a lot about this problem, but I don't think it's a mental thing. We have to work at this and I just hope the problem will be solved very soon. Fulham played champagne football at times. They have good players, they are our cousins and I hope they can be as successful as we have been.
"We have to sort out our problems quickly but we are still unbeaten and it's important to keep picking up points."
Despite a summer outlay of pounds 35m, Chelsea are still unable to close out matches when it counts. They lost leads against Newcastle, Middlesbrough and now Fulham.
The six points dropped would have been enough to put them top of the Premiership. Fulham midfielder John Collins believes his side should have gone on to claim a victory.
He said: "We gave Chelsea too much respect early on. But in the second half, when we equalised, I thought we were the better team.
"We were relieved to be in the game at half-time. They outplayed us but then we came back at them.
"It was disappointing that they were down to 10 men and we were at home but still couldn't win."
CAPTION(S):
RANIERI: Scratching his head; GETTING SHIRTY: Referee Graham Poll makes his point of view crystal clear to Chelsea's Marcel Desailly
 Printer friendly
 Cite/link
 Email
 Feedback
| |
| Title Annotation: | Sport |
|---|---|
| Publication: | The Mirror (London, England) |
| Date: | Oct 1, 2001 |
| Words: | 368 |
| Previous Article: | Football: BARRY'S FUTURE IN DOUBT; Gregory axe for outspoken star. |
| Next Article: | Football: Richards: The way we lost that was criminal. |