Liam Rosenior has struggled to find a set of tactics that have worked for Chelsea defensively.
Against Everton, Chelsea set up in a defensive block rather than pressing man-to-man across the pitch.
This shape looked like a 4-4-2 with Pedro Neto and Cole Palmer on the left and right of midfield and Enzo Fernandes and Joao Pedro up top.
Chelsea looked to keep an extra man on their defensive line so as Everton attacked with three players, they kept four defenders back. This meant they had a player short elsewhere, often higher up the pitch.
Both strikers, Enzo Fernandez and Pedro, were tasked with applying pressure to the Everton defenders and likely asked to block passes into the defensive midfielders.
In actuality, the far-side striker failed to apply any meaningful pressure on Everton's defensive midfielder.
Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall was often seen dropping in, dragging one of Chelsea's midfielders with him. With one of the strikers drawn to the Everton defender on the ball, the defensive midfielder was the spare man in situations that looked like 3 against 2 in favour of Everton.
This pattern was seen for Beto's opener with Garner finding himself facing forward, able to play a through ball, unopposed following Dewsbury-Hall's lay-off.
Man-to-man pressure can be beaten through rotations and technical quality, as we saw in Chelsea's losses to PSG. Zonal defending in theory should make the pitch compact with the attacking side struggling to play through you. On the night however Chelsea left gaps that were costly.
