Three damning moments for Liam Rosenior as he hints he's lost Chelsea dressing room

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Liam Rosenior's reign as Chelsea boss plumbed new depths as they were smashed 3-0 at Brighton. Rampant Albion, who have been purged by Chelsea for talent in recent times, leapfrogged the Blues into sixth place thanks to goals from Ferdi Kadioglu, Jack Hinshelwood and substitute Danny Welbeck.

Chelsea, whose hopes of qualifying for the Champions League are all but over, are in danger of missing out on European football altogether after suffering five consecutive league defeats without scoring for the first time since 1912, the year the Titanic sank. The Blues remain seven points adrift of fifth-placed Liverpool, having now played a game more.

Just three months into the job, the former Derby and Hull boss is in danger of being another manager spat out by the Chelsea machine. Here are three moments that have contributed to Rosenior's probable demise…

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Rosenior ditched his policy of defending the players following the humiliation at the Amex, accusing them of lacking pride and telling them to look in the mirror. He fumed: "In the basics, in the pride that you should have in wearing the shirt, that was unacceptable.

"I've defended the players and I am accountable. I've always said that. After tonight, I think the players as well need to have a look in the mirror for what they put in.

"You can talk about tactics, tactics come after the basics. Having more courage to play, winning duels, winning headers, tackles, conceding terrible goals. That was an unacceptable performance tonight."

That's all well and good if your surname is Mourinho, Conte or Tuchel but it's questionable whether such an approach from a rookie Premier League boss will have the desired effect or just hasten his demise.

It's becoming abundantly clear that Resenior and his players aren't on the same page. The head coach claimed that only "three of four of the starting 11" showed the required effort. He said: "Chelsea represents fight and spirit and determination. That was lacking in every department this evening."

The stats would support Rosenior's damning claim, with Chelsea covering less ground per game than any other Premier League side this season. However, after the Brighton game, Trevoh Chalobah insisted there was no lack of effort from the players, even if his defence of the performance was far from convincing.

He said: "We gave our all. Just not the better side. I don't know. We obviously had a game plan. We tried to execute it and... We tried our best. We worked on it throughout the week and obviously we got beat today."

Chalobah added: "We know how much the fans have been behind us and we know they're disappointed. I think personally the boys were running their socks off."

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If he hasn't lost the players, then he has certainly lost the fans. Blues supporters had previously been directing their ire at the club's owners.

However, at Brighton, Rosenior was the target of their frustration, with chants of "f*** off Rosenior" ringing out from the away end.

If he is given one more game, the FA Cup semi-final against Leeds, the growls of discontent could be heard on a much bigger scale. Defeat to Leeds would almost certainly be the final act of his troubled reign.

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