Oakland Raiders: A few keys to beating Chargers in week five matchup

The Oakland Raiders head south to play what will amount to another home game against the Chargers – here are a few keys to a win.

The Oakland Raiders notched their first win of the season last week, having to work overtime to beat the Cleveland Browns. It was a game filled with highs, lows, and everything in between.

But hey, as they say, a win is a win, and that’s all that counts for anything in this league.

With the win, the Raiders move their record up to an underwhelming, and entirely maddening 1-3. This is a team that’s led at halftime of all three losses, and has taken leads well into the fourth quarter of two of them.

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This is a team that, if not for some mind-numbingly stupid, unforced errors, could easily be sitting at 3-1on the year. To take that a step further, had they been able to pull their heads out of their collective backsides against the Rams in week one, this is a team that could have been 4-0.

Realistically speaking though, this is a team that could have been – and should have been – 3-1 after the first quarter of the NFL season. Late game collapses, moronic blunders, bad decision making, and hate to say it, but poor coaching and game plans, have all contributed to this team being well outside the playoff bubble, looking in.

But, we have to deal with reality, rather than indulge in the coulda, shoulda, and woulda’s of life. And the reality is that this team is 1-3, and has a lot of work to do if they hope to climb out of their self-inflicted hole, and somehow clamber their way back into contention.

The good news for the Raiders is that it’s early yet, and there’s still time to get things moving in the right direction. There is still time for this team to get themselves into a position to be jockeying for a playoff slot.

It won’t be easy, but it’s possible. After all, if this team strings together some consecutive wins – and there are some very winnable games on the road ahead – who knows what might happen?

But, that has to start now. Beginning with this week’s game against the division rival LA Chargers.

The 2-2 Chargers have been inconsistent thus far this season. At best. After routing Buffalo in week two, they were dominated by the Rams in week three, and barely got by a San Francisco 49ers team that was missing its franchise quarterback Jimmy Garoppolo, and instead had to run out the usually ineffective C.J. Beathard.

LA has plenty of its own issues to contend with, which means there are definite chinks in the armor for this Raiders team to take advantage of. The question right now is, are they equipped and able to exploit those flaws?

We’ll find out soon enough. For now, let’s take a look at a of the keys to beating the LA Chargers…