The players lack guts, it’s not that complicated. Every single game that passes validates Conte’s farewell rant. The first 10 games there was no pressure. Nobody knew what to expect from us, we lost Harry, it was a free hit. It was just nice to play on the front foot. We went in front in virtually every game and everyone was smiling.
Now that the top 4 is within our reach there is actual pressure and our weak players are being crushed by it. During that spell when VDV, Romero, Son, Maddison etc were all missing we played with far more intensity that we are now. We didn’t win many games but the players were sweating blood, especially Emerson and Davies at CB. Those two played away at City and they worked a hell of a lot harder than the players who started today.
If you have good players it really isn’t that hard to win a match. Be aggressive with and without the ball. That’s pretty much it. Newcastle did it and we didn’t. They had about 12 players missing and they were still more up for it than us.