Cahill offers no excuses after surprise Chelsea loss at Palace

Gary Cahill was not looking to give excuses after Chelsea suffered a shock 2-1 defeat at Crystal Palace on Saturday.

An own goal from Cesar Azpilicueta and Wilfried Zaha’s strike earned the Eagles their first win of the campaign against the reigning Premier League champions.

After the game, Cahill was pretty blunt in his assessment: “The performance level today was not up to the standard it should be. We played poorly today, for whatever reason.

“We’ve had many international players who have been away but that’s part and parcel of modern football. We need to be ready, we needed to be more lively, we were missing out on second balls. That’s unlike us.

“We’re not having the best of luck in terms of injuries – you saw Victor Moses today – and we’ve not got the biggest squad. But it needed to be a better performance today.

“We need to win games like this, and in terms of the title after Christmas we need to be there or thereabouts. We are disappointed by the result and disappointed in the quality of our performance.

“Listen, the best thing to do now is to play again as soon as possible. We can do better than that and we’re very disappointed.”