Chelsea F.C [2010-2011]

[poet11]

blues fans hello.spot on creativemantra thats whats went wrong for sure.torres may help u for champions league one of the favourites for sure.ancelloti did that before with milan.they then had the players in the same age as now chelsea have and table in serie a looked almost the same.if it doesnt go that way then chelsea may be in deep trouble and the core of that could be nandos transfer.it was a clear message to drogba,anelka(though he coped well and his body language was not that alarming but drogbas was),and maybe to some extent(not so much because he is adaptible to many positions).and everyone knows drogba.then again carlo again made another mistake.in the post match interview he said luiz and torres are the future of the club and he also said he was willing to change the formation of the team to a diamond.and watever the season ends like if carlo stays im more than sure they will go for kaka.his arrival may be good maybe bad u never know.and when carlo arrived he wanted to bring players like gattuso and pirlo!!!imagine they cant last 90 minutes in serieA where the tempo is so low.chelsea fans just pray that carlo handles the dressing room perfectly.you know drogba is emotional and talks more than listens less.so best wishes

 

[Zakov]

Liverpool got their chances twice both from poor defending in our point of view.
They set-up their plan well, it was obvious that Carlo was going to repeat the same shape that beat Sunderland last week, but I thought the game probably came too early for Torres, especially against his old team.

He visibly looked shaken and wasn't up for it at all, Drog had to go wide and deep to accommodate his new strike partner, and he had a poor game as a result of it. Bosingwa Luiz and Essien are probably the only positives out of the game, Anelka, Lamps were particularly disappointing.

I'm surprised we didn't play with Ramires instead of Mikel as he looked to have settled in the team in the previous games. Mikel looked a bit off the pace strangely enough.

Nevertheless, its sort of an anti-climax after all the mayhem during the week about the big transfers we made. Liverpool did deserve this victory, they defended well and made life very difficult for our attacking frontline. On another day, we could've gotten at least a penalty but no use moaning about that now.

I can't wait till Alex comes back. I'd like to think that our slump had to do with him getting injured(since the win against Arsenal). A JT/Alex partnership is probably the best we have, while Iva doesn't like playing at RB, he's probably the best option we have there just ahead of Bosingwa.

 

[mnj2x]

Oh yea and the torres banner even before he kicked a ball for chelsea was just premature. Ridiculous really.

 

[Zakov]

Pretty brilliant job by Dalglish really. He didn't try to just throw his best guys out there, but he anticipated the Chelsea set-up and specifically countered it. He wasn't going to win big, but a draw or a 1-0 win was probably the most likely result and he got it.

I'm surprised no one mentioned about Steve Clarke's involvement in all this.
Clarkie was Jose's number two for a while at Chelsea, he knows the club inside out as a player and assistant manager, I wouldn't be surprised if he had a large say in the way Liverpool shaped up.

I don't mean to put down Dalglish but it has been quite a while since he was last involved in managing, the game has clearly changed A LOT since then.

 

[ShiftyPowers]

Fair enough, but in that case I commend him for taking advise from other people better situated than himself. How many managers are too arrogant to listen to anyone else's opinion.

 

[Zakov]

Fair enough, but in that case I commend him for taking advise from other people better situated than himself. How many managers are too arrogant to listen to anyone else's opinion.

I reckon that's why he brought Clarkie as his assistant in the first place, to give him options and advice. As mentioned before, Dalglish has been out of the game for a long while.

Managers who are too arrogant shouldn't even consider hiring assistants in the first place. Unless, they hire a bunch of "Yes" men(the groupthink lot) of course it would suit their arses perfectly.
Dalglish should be commended for bringing Clarke in the first place though, Jose certainly did rate him. We should've kept him but he wanted to leave to work with Franco.

I always thought that after sacking Wilkins, the club would've turned to Clarkie again, but that wasn't to be unfortunately.

 

[Coruja]

How good was David Luiz? I see that he made a penalty...

 

[ARIAGA II]

MOM IMO. Despite the penalty he was pretty solid.

 

[Zakov]

Yep, best player for us by far. From the looks of it, Luiz is the better deal out of two the way things stand. He settled in very quickly into the side.

Pointing out orders to his teammates and being very vocal on the pitch as well. Definitely future captain material.

 

[Coruja]

Thats awesome.

 

[Dah Shinin']

Honestly Chelsea should just be happy with top 4 finish at this stage, I can't see them winning anything. We blew way too many chances to get back into it.

 

[poet11]

though being a gunner my favorite to win the champions league is chelsea.buying Torres at such a delicate moment could be very dangerous.its a good thing to change a ageing team but its not for january take a look at drogbas expression.he knows that this might be his last season with blues.same for anelka and malouda.players not treated fairly could cause too much damage.example madrid.

 

[Mandieta6]

Definitely out of the title race. Just watched parts of the match and Luiz looked very good. We NEED to clinch a CL spot, so we need to get going again. Anything other than Top 4 is unforgivable, and I would've said anything other than Top 2 earlier in the season.

 

[BolT|Kr]

Yep, best player for us by far. From the looks of it, Luiz is the better deal out of two the way things stand. He settled in very quickly into the side.

Pointing out orders to his teammates and being very vocal on the pitch as well. Definitely future captain material.

I agree with u David, is very skillful, David y terry a very good combination.

Honestly Chelsea should just be happy with top 4 finish at this stage, I can't see them winning anything. We blew way too many chances to get back into it.

the development of this season for Chelsea has been a failure for what was expected, the struggle of the league is still standing, and at least they wish to take the FA Cup.

 

[Help?]

I still can't believe how quickly you self-destructed. Thin aging squad or not, this team should not be where they are right now.

 

[Zakov]

Be it what it is right now, everyone in the club can learn a lot from what happened this season.

The higher ups should learn not to meddle with the harmony of the coaching staff during the course of the season. ie- Sacking Ray Wilkins when we were on a good run.

Never overrule the coach's recommendation in which player he wants to keep. ie - Carlo wanted to keep Ballack for this season but was overruled because of Ballack's age.

We also need to be improving our medical department. I can't help thinking how poor our medical staff is currently, the way Lamps was out most of this season, Essien's mysterious pro-longed layoff last year, Bosingwa, Benayoun, Alex.

Although its true we can't predict nor avoid injuries to our players I always thought that once one of our players are injured in a game it'll keep dragging on and it'll be weeks/months before they come back. Not much confidence in our medical staff currently, we were decent when Jose was here, with the exception of Robben.

We need to salvage what we can from this season, from what I've seen the players lack the hunger and determination that they had previously last season in the league. But we've always looked good in the Champions League, so there's an outside chance of us nicking it this year if we can pick up form, get a lucky draw on the way, make sure Drog keeps his head and proper refereeing in the crucial stages of the competition.

 

[Help?]

Didn't you have the best medical staff in the country 4-5 years ago? Did they leave with Jose?

 

[Zakov]

Yes they did.

 

[Pogba4Now]

As the team gets older, the players become more injury prone. It has nothing to do with your medical staff. Also, you don't have depth at all. Players don't get that much of rest.

 

[Zakov]

As the team gets older, the players become more injury prone. It has nothing to do with your medical staff. Also, you don't have depth at all. Players don't get that much of rest.

While I agree mostly, Essien and Bosingwa were long term absentees last season, and they certainly do not fit in the category of being old. Lamps, he was unfortunate that it happened to him this season but he was pretty much available for every other season he's played here. I don't think age necessarily has an impact over the frequency of injuries although recovery of it, yes.
Milan had two outfield 40 year old players in the same squad at one stage, think it was Paolo Maldini and Alessandro Costacurta.

As for depth, at one stage I thought we had it covered but Alex's and Terry's injuries at the same time proved to be a hammer blow, Paulo played as CB at Sunderland and we were trounced and you could say that was the beginning of the end of our title hopes, although hindsight is always 20/20.

The biggest mistake was letting go Carvalho and not replacing him.
If Luiz arrived in the summer, we definitely would've fared better defensively.

On the lighter side of things, here's Bruno Demichelis. the geezer who's supposed to be Carlo's assistant and in charge of the physical state of the players.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/fo...ught-Injuries-piled-Chelsea-form-slipped.html