JOHN TERRY says inexperience could cost Chelsea a shot at the title after their desperate performance at Leeds.
The Blues legend has hit out at Enzo Maresca‘s men for a timid display at Elland Road and also criticised the manager’s rotation.
Maresca made five changes – one enforced with Moises Caicedo suspended – and his second string imploded at Leeds.
After blowing away Barcelona and battling brilliantly against Arsenal, Chelsea suddenly find themselves nine-points adrift of the Premier League leaders.
Speaking on social media, Terry blasted: “What a poor performance that was. Everything I said about Leeds away is they’re going to be aggressive, the fans are going to be up for it, the fans are going to be hostile.
“You either have to match them or you go and take the sting out of it completely and we certainly didn’t do that in the first half.
“We showed glimpses in the second half when [Pedro] Neto comes on and gets back in the game at 2-1 but we can’t perform like that.
“We can’t follow two unbelievable performances against Barcelona and Arsenal because it’s certainly not going to make you title contenders at the end of it.
“That’s what’s going to cost us at the end of it, we’re inexperienced and if you can’t go Leeds away and know what to expect. You need to go there and show the fight and match Leeds in every single way.
“You need to earn the right to play and after 15, 20 minutes then you play your football. We didn’t do that and that’s going to cost us.
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“We’ve got Bournemouth away and some tough away fixtures coming up which are only getting tougher. We need to find a way to deal with that.
“Even when I played you know Leeds away a fight is on your hands right from the word go. You need to make sure everyone’s up for it.
“Goal from a set piece, individual mistakes, defensively there were mistakes. Clearly not good enough.”
Chelsea boss Maresca has made more changes across all competitions than any other Premier League manager this season.
It is a policy the board and sporting directors are fully behind, but has cost the Blues on occasion in both Europe and the Premier League.
Now Terry feels Maresca should start sticking to a tried and tested side.
He added: “Maybe that’s an opportunity for the manager to look at the squad and go, ‘Rotation is not for me going forward, I know my best starting XI or 13, 14 players and I’m going to stick with that and the players are just going to have to deal with it’.”
