Sunday cover: Chelsea’s problems coming into Crystal clear focus

The National's Sport cover for the Sunday, August 30 issue, featuring Thibaut Courtois and reeling Chelsea after a shock home defeat to Crystal Palace.

Greg Lea touches on the difficulty already facing the Premier League champions as they've stumbled to a four-points-in-four-matches haul to begin the new campaign. With two losses already compared to three all of last term in the league, Chelsea sit eight points off the early Manchester City pace and, writes Greg, "little margin for error from here".

“Even at this stage of the campaign, eight points is a sizeable deficit to make up. Incredibly, this was Palace’s eighth away victory in 10 outings in the top flight under Alan Pardew, but title challengers simply have to win this type of encounter.

“Chelsea were surprisingly flat and devoid of creativity, with the sturdiness of the midfield coming under further scrutiny after Palace continually found space in dangerous areas.

“Such a blunt display in Jose Mourinho’s 100th Premier League game at Stamford Bridge stands in stark contrast to the swashbuckling manner in which Chelsea raced out of the blocks this time last year.”

Crystal Palace, he adds, “put Mourinho’s men eight points behind leaders Manchester City and with a mountain to climb after just four matches”.

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