Chelsea’s horror run of form continued as Everton condemned them to their fourth consecutive defeat across all competitions – and Liam Rosenior took responsibility and says he is the one to blame. The Toffees thrashed the Blues 3-0 in a Premier League rout at the Hill Dickinson Stadium with Beto scoring a brace and Iliman Ndiaye finding the top corner. The defeat sees Chelsea waste a valuable chance to leapfrog fifth-placed Liverpool, who lost to Brighton earlier the same day. Just a draw would have been enough to overtake the Reds on goal difference.

Instead, the Londoners’ woeful streak continued with another heavy loss. The nightmare 10 days began with a 5-2 defeat against PSG in France. That was followed by a 1-0 home defeat to Newcastle in the Premier League before the second leg against PSG ended 3-0 to the French giants, completing a humiliating 8-2 aggregate defeat. The defeat to Everton means Chelsea have conceded 12 goals in their last four games, while scoring only two. It is only the second time since the 1990s that they have lost four in a row.

The away end at Everton was virtually empty by the full-time whistle and Rosenior said post-match: “It’s a disappointing time for the club at the moment in terms of the way we lost in the Champions League and the way we’ve lost the last two games. My job, it hurts. Regardless of your position, it hurts to lose games of football.

“In terms of moving forward and having this time is to look at the bigger picture. We’re one point away from the Champions League position. We need to keep working in this way. We need to keep giving the players as much confidence as possible and hopefully this break of games now for us comes at a really good moment.

“This was the most disappointing evening so far in terms of the things we’ve spoken about, not gifting goals away and making sure we’re in the game, getting control of the game. It wasn’t there and it turned into a really, really difficult evening where the result and performance was nowhere near what we expected or wanted.

Rosenior accepted the blame for Chelsea’s defensive frailties. He added: “The first goal seems quite similar to the one [vs Newcastle], but when you watch the goal back, it’s not a tactical thing. We didn’t go man for man today. We played 4-4-2. I thought our shape was actually very good. We controlled their possession. They didn’t expect it.

“They ended up kicking the ball back to us a lot of the time, and we gained control of the game. And then it’s a moment. It’s a moment of switching off. I want to protect my players always. I always will. And I take responsibility for that lapse in concentration, but that’s what it is. And that’s happened too many times in my time recently for me not to tell the truth as it is.

“For me, I don’t think there’s a lack of effort. I don’t think there’s a lack of belief or determination in the team. In fact, I felt like Enzo kept going until the very, very last minute today. So, I’m aware when you’re on a run of defeats that we’re on, and when you’re on a run of performances that we’ve had, those things get levelled at you. But I don’t think that’s the issue in this moment.”

Everton ran further than Chelsea, who have been outrun in every single one of their Premier League matches so far this season. The Blues manager added: “I think through the season, if you look at the stats before me, they were very similar. I think what I don’t want to do, I don’t want to be seen to make excuses because that was not good enough.

“The last week hasn’t been good enough. I think if you’re a logical thinking person and you look at the workload and the amount of games that the players have played, I think it’s a pretty simple conclusion to come to. Why I think the international break has come at a good time for us is because hopefully those players get a change.

“Most of them have to fly across the world and play for their countries. But maybe a reset, maybe some time away to regather and have a different environment and come back may refresh the group.”

Chelsea have now gone over 300 minutes without scoring a goal, since Enzo Fernandez made it 2-2 away at PSG in the 57th minute. Rosenior continued: “I think if you keep arriving and creating the moments that you do, you take them.

“For me, statistically, if you go through each game, it’s not for a lack of shots, it’s not for a lack of final third entries. That’s where we need to be more clinical and that’s something we need to work on.”

Chelsea face a very difficult run of fixtures between now and the end of the season with Manchester City visiting Stamford Bridge next up, and Manchester United the visitors just six days later. A crunch clash with Liverpool at Anfield also awaits in mid-May.