Antonio Conte Must Show More Ambition to Turn Chelsea's Failures into Success

LONDON STADIUM, London — He doesn't get much wrong, but Antonio Conte blew it against West Ham United in the EFL Cup on Wednesday.

The Chelsea boss made seven changes to the side that had beaten Manchester United 4-0 just three days earlier, losing the momentum a recent winning streak had helped build up in west London.

After a damaging September, the Blues have looked reformed over the past month or so, but so many changes for a crunch cup game has left a sour taste.

With no European football to contend with, it means Chelsea are now playing for just two trophies this season. The Premier League remains a tough ask for a side that finished 2015/16 in 10th place, leaving them with just the FA Cup as a realistic option.

The EFL Cup was an opportunity for Conte to continue the development of his team by putting more silverware in the trophy cabinet. That had to be the end game in this competition, as it will be when the FA Cup comes around early in the new year.

Running the risk of going over old ground, it was that thinking Jose Mourinho had when he took over at Chelsea back in 2004.

The Blues were a different club back then; the mandate was about achieving something that hadn't been done before and Mourinho used the League Cup as a means of helping him realise that aim.

By chasing glory at the first opportunity, the Portuguese underlined his need to get his players winning things collectively. From there, Chelsea added the Premier League to their 2004/05 haul and more trophies would follow for that vastly talented group of players.

Fast forward to the present, Conte isn't attempting to build a dynasty. It's too early for any of that; he is repairing a fractured club, and it's by winning football matches that we will see those cracks begin to heal. Defeating Manchester United—Mourinho’s United no less—the way they did was a big step forward in that; losing to West Ham feels like a shuffle in the wrong direction.

If we look at the balance of play against Slaven Bilic's side, Conte is correct in his assertions that Chelsea were unfortunate to leave the London Stadium with nothing. Diego Costa could have scored a couple, while Michy Batshuayi, N'Golo Kante and John Terry all went close before Gary Cahill's late consolation (that’s two goals in two matches for him, by the way. That should keep his critics at bay).

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Those facts don't excuse what was a disjointed performance from Chelsea, which came about through Conte's desire to change the entire complexion of his side against the Hammers. Cesar Azpilicueta and Ola Aina struggled as the wing-backs and that meant Batshauyi was isolated in attack without enough support.

In the back three, moving David Luiz to the right side to accommodate John Terry's return also brought the worst out of the Brazilian. He was back to the erratic performances that so infuriated Mourinho before he eventually sold him to Paris Saint-Germain in 2014.

Before now, Luiz has looked an assured presence as the central figure. The defending has been done by Cahill and Azpilicueta in this new formation we're seeing, leaving the Brazil international to be the sweeper and clean up before getting attacks started. It may not have been by design given the Blues' other summer transfer targets, yet Conte has found a player who is ideal for the changes he is making to Chelsea’s style of play.

Bilic may have been singing the praises of his players for defeating Chelsea, but he will know this wasn't the same Chelsea that beat United on Sunday. The experiments Conte dallied with were too much and the Blues paid the price for it.

"It's always difficult to answer this question," Conte responded when Bleacher Report asked if his changes had impacted the display we saw from his team.

"If you remember, against Leicester [in the previous round], we did the same. I repeat, this season we have a few opportunities to see the players who don't usually play a lot and also the young players. But for me, the performance was good; when you create so many chances to win but you don't, it's a pity. I saw many positive things.”

Chelsea’s character and desire to chase this result to the last ranked high on that list of positives Conte was talking about. As a squad, it shows that they are back in the right frame of mind. Oscar and Willian may not have been as productive as the manager hoped, but it wasn’t through a lack of endeavour.

Chelsea grafted collectively. It was a sign that first-team regulars and those on the fringes are au fait with what the manager is demanding—the message has been received.

The same can be said for youngsters Aina and Nathaniel Chalobah. The former showed his inexperience, but Chalobah looks like a player who has over 100 senior appearances to his name after multiple loan spells away from the club. Under Conte, he is growing into a player who has a future at Chelsea.

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The club doesn’t have a future in the EFL Cup for the rest of this season and that is a disappointment to rival anything Conte can spin. There are now fewer games for him to look at fringe players and there is one less trophy his team can win this season.

Chelsea have to show more ambition this year. It all seemed half-hearted on Wednesday, almost regressing to pre-season when we hear that results don’t matter; it’s performances that we should be looking at. Well, trophies matter, and Conte has helped ensure that the Blues' chances of going another year without silverware have been heightened.

Chelsea are the better of the two teams, and the fact they left the London Stadium feeling hard done by despite fielding a patchwork side outlines that fact all the more.

Conte can’t do this again; he has to find a better balance when the time calls for it. There’s too much at risk for Chelsea for him not to.

Garry Hayes is Bleacher Report's lead Chelsea correspondent. Follow him on Twitter @garryhayes