Didier Drogba's 1st two seasons

[Tomo 21,681]

It has been constantly said that Didier Drogba was poor on his 1st two season's with us, he got 16 goals in both seasons (his joint 3rd best tally's at the club).

During his 1st season at the club he was injured for the majority of the 1st half of the season and when he came back he scored a vital goal in the CC final and 2 vital goals at vital times against Bayern Munich also as the season got on he was scoring ans setting up more, for a 1st season in the league i think he did really well. During his 2nd season he was swithching with Crespo a lot but still produced some top performances, we also ran away with the title both season's.

I think a lot of the reason people thought Drogba was crap in his 1st season is that they were comparing it to his 3rd when he was single handedly keeping us in a title race. During the back to back title season's he Rooben, Duff, Cole, Lampard, Gudjohnsen and Crespo (2nd season) were chipping in with their fair share of goals aswell, even Terry got a healthy amount from defence.

But during 06/07 Lampard was still banging goals in but Duff, Gudjohnsen and Crespo jumped ship the goals from Rooben, Cole and Terry somewhat dried up and there was a massive injury crisis and Drogs goals were single handedly keeping us in a title race, so maybe people are comparing those 2 season's to his 3rd and saying he was crap, imo he did ok in his 1st 2 years just not as good as the 3rd.

thougts?

[BlueLion. 21,491]

I don't think he's ever had a bad season at the club. His overall play in 05/06 was better than it was in 06/07, but in the latter he scored twice as many goals. Judging him by goals alone doesn't do his work-rate justice, but this season he has let his high standards slip because of the malaria scare and so on. In my opinion, whilst he's always had a good goalscoring return each season (he averages 20 goals a season), he's only really had one outstanding season overall (last year) and two excellent seasons by scoring goals (06/07 and 09/10). That being said, he is a true Chelsea legend.

[Tomo 21,681]

I don't think he's ever had a bad season at the club. His overall play in 05/06 was better than it was in 06/07, but in the latter he scored twice as many goals. Judging him by goals alone doesn't do his work-rate justice, but this season he has let his high standards slip because of the malaria scare and so on. In my opinion, whilst he's always had a good goalscoring return each season (he averages 20 goals a season), he's only really had one outstanding season overall (last year) and two excellent seasons by scoring goals (06/07 and 09/10). That being said, he is a true Chelsea legend.

[Rambo 1,729]

That being said, he is a true Chelsea legend.

Gutted if he doesn't end his career here but wouldn't be surprised either. Hope he can recapture his form soon and score some goals.

[Badboy 1,526]

Drogba was a much better team player in his first 2 seasons he sacrificed himself so he could open space for Robben, Duff, Lampard. Drogba was the top of the assist ranking in his second season and he absolutely destroyed Liverpool at anfield, I WAS THERE !

[LDN Blue 7,903]

I wouldn't say they were poor but perhaps they didn't meet our initial expectations. We did pay a lot for him (£24million was a lot back then) and he didn't look like the best of investments with Gudjohnsen, Kezman & Crespo still at the club. However he was showing signs of developing into a great player (as opposed to someone like Kalou) which is why we were patient. Though I do remember some awful chants back in the day!

Comparing his first season with Malouda's though, Drogba wiped the floor with him

[Henrique 9,133]

For what we paid for him at that time, he was really poor. He was our most expensive player. Thats why we took Crespo back in 05/06 season, and after that we bought Shevchenko, that was when he started to play a good football.

[Ollie 4,400]

Drogba in 04/05 was not used to the pace of our game but was a huge presence and his work rate/team work was better perhaps than it is now. He was straight away considered as Chelsea main striker because he clearly had everything, just needed to put it all together. The goals weren't really there in his first couple of years but an interesting thing to look at is actually how well he did when he had a partner. In 05/06 he had Crespo and they had a fantastic understanding from nothing, they teamed up so well and instinctively knew where each other were and scored many between them when they were on the pitch at the same time. In 06/07, Sheva came and suddenly everyone was watching him, Drogba scored 33 goals and much of that was because of Sheva being there and making different runs and having more players paying all their attention on them, it suited Drogs down to the ground although poor Sheva just got abuse for not scoring loads of goals although he gave everything, it certainly wasn't without trying. By 2009, DD was the complete premiership striker that could play in any system and score lots of goals. In every season, he's brought something to the team, just wish he would wake up a bit more this season though, think he needs a slap.