Toothless Chelsea Scarcely Deserve Early UCL Qualification After Basel Humbling

Matchday 5 in the Champions League—it's beginning to haunt Chelsea.

It was at this stage last year they were all but eliminated from the competition after suffering a 3-0 defeat to Juventus. And 12 months on, a similarly poor display in Switzerland saw Basel complete a European double over the Blues, humbling them 1-0.

The outcome was quite the opposite to that fateful evening in Turin, though. As luck would have it, Group E rivals Schalke could only manage a goalless draw away to Steaua Bucharest, meaning Chelsea have now qualified for the knockout stages.

A win next week at home to bottom team Steaua will secure top spot in the group, but it will do little to hide what was a concerning display for Jose Mourinho's team.

"[It was] a bad performance," the Chelsea manager reflected on Sky TV. "[It was] a deserved defeat, but because of other results we qualify and that's the only positive thing from this night."

"Everything frustrated me—right from the first minute."

And so it should have. Chelsea barely strung a significant sequence of passes together throughout the entire the 90 minutes and, worse still, didn't even record a single shot on goal.

For a team boasting the talents of Oscar, Willian, Ramires, Samuel Eto'o and Frank Lampard in their line-up, it's an embarrassing statistic.

Talk about an anti-climax.

Against West Ham United on Saturday, the Blues were excellent. They dominated proceedings from the off and were clinical in the opposition half. Facing Basel, they were anything but.

Indeed, with respect to their Swiss opponents, it was they who looked the team ranked among the favorites for Champions League success. They were a threat in attack, while their midfield dominated Chelsea's, giving them little room to settle and attempt to take control.

In Mohamed Salah—scorer of the winning goal in the 86th minute, his third against Chelsea in as many matches no less—they have a player who is going to be attracting plenty of attention come January.

"The team only had a little bit of stability and control in the second half but I felt they were too tired. The team paid the price of the international break," Mourinho continued.

"The players were tired. No reactions. Wrong decisions. I am not so sad with them as I understand. The team was not fresh."

It's a fair observation from Mourinho. These past few weeks have seen his players hit the road and travel the globe with their countries. Yet he knew that before kick-off, so why not rotate his team at such a hectic period of the season?

Juan Mata cut a lonely figure on the bench for the Blues yet again, but with his experience and skill in the middle, Chelsea may have exerted more authority on the game, controlling possession much better.

He must now be a certainty to start on Sunday when Southampton visit Stamford Bridge, although one player who looks like he will be missing is front man Eto'o after the Cameroonian striker was stretchered off in the first half.

Chelsea are suffering very un-Mourinho like problems right now. When we think his team has finally turned the corner and are building their form, tragedy strikes once more and their inconsistency rumbles on into December.

It's concerning and means the satisfaction in securing their Champions League participation in the second half of the season is nothing but a footnote with bigger issues at hand.

Garry Hayes is Bleacher Report's lead Chelsea correspondent and will be following the club from a London base throughout the 2013-14 season. Follow him on Twitter here @garryhayes