Chelsea players file out of Stamford Bridge, head bowed

Jose Mourinho has threatened to axe two or three under-performing players after his Chelsea team fell to Crystal Palace at Stamford Bridge on Saturday afternoon.

Although the defeat was only the Portuguese’s second in a league game at the stadium, he has identified three  players who he felt were below-par.

He however  refused to name the culprits.

But Mourinho revealed his patience is starting to wear thin, saying: ‘If a player is not performing there are two ways to look at it.

‘The first one is that I trust the player so much that I will wait for the improvement. You wait, wait, and wait and maybe it comes or it doesn’t come.

‘Or, even when you are trusting the player arrives a moment when you think, “I have to change”. And I can go both ways.

I’m not happy with the performance because, for me, a performance is a collective performance, of 11 players at the same time.

‘To perform collectively you need individual performances. When you have these kind of matches at this level you need people to perform.

‘I cannot say I had 11 players at the same time performing. Two or three of them their individual performance was far from good.

‘I blame myself for not changing one of them. When I made the third change I needed a fourth.’

When asked for the identity of that player, Mourinho responded: ‘It’s the last thing I’m going to tell you.’

With the international break now looming, the Chelsea manager said he is helpless to rectify his side’s worrying start to the season.

‘Because of the international break the next match is in 15 days,’ he said.

‘I don’t know what happens in 15 days, every player goes away with their national team and I stay for two weeks with four players.

‘I can’t work, I can’t improve. At this moment I can’t do anything during these two weeks to improve my team.’