OhForAGreavsie

You may be right but I'll be sad if you are. Petr certainly won't damage his legacy in my eyes, no matter who he joins. If and when he returns to The Bridge I'll cheer him at the top of my voice and I'd bet a lot of money that I'll be in the majority. The large majority.

Just saw the very end of the BTSport coverage and Ruben played no part in the goal which came from a 20 yard strike following a corner. They did not show the build up to the corner however so I don't know if Ruben was involved in that. The two studio pundits, as well as England U21 manager Gareth Southgate, were full of praise for him. The two lads in the studio both said they feel he should start against Italy in game 3.

:) Forgive me if I have this wrong but I'm used to being one of the oldest people here. I'm therefore assuming that you are younger than me so allow me to make the following observation: - The day will also come when you can't tell what bloody colour it is!

We all love Shankley's brilliant witticism. The great man's words encapsulated the attitude of football fans all over the world, but he certainly wouldn't have meant it literally. Football is not more important than life. Taking care of the interests of his wife and children is the very essence of what it is to be a man. My own guess was that Petr and his wife would have chosen to give their children a chance to experience a different culture. If, however, their decision is that London is the place for their family, then London it has to be. That narrows Petr's choice to staying or going to Arsenal. He's a footballer, he's in the prime of his career, he wants to start. Of course he wants to start. I love the man too. I also love my club and I love it even more for being classy enough to allow one of our heroes to make his own choice. By the way, I've heard the argument before that Petr took over when Carlo was injured. That's not what Carlo says, it's not what Jose says and it's not what the evidence says. Carlo's agent, whose job it is to spin as hard as he can for his client, is quoted in one place (that I know of) as having made that claim. It ain't so however, Carlo lost the jersey before he was injured.

Thanks UJ, useful info. That's one for the lawyers.

I agree with all of this but I'm still not in favour. On the atmosphere, it's been an issue for our club for decades. People used to say the reason The Bridge lacked passion was because the terracing was so far from the pitch. I never bought that argument and I don't believe that the hope of improving atmosphere is a good enough reason to bring standing back.

Was a White Waller myself. Loved it but, for me, standing ramps up the testosterone levels. Outright hooliganism, racism and other assorted misbehaviour blighted our game for more than two decades and I don't think we are completely out of the woods yet. I'm not especially worried about violence in the ground, I think modern systems could help clubs keep a lid on that, but I am concerned about people returning to the excitable days. The ugly atmosphere that often surrounded football in the bad old days was horrible to live through and it emptied grounds all over the country. Each and ever one of the measures which were introduced as counter measures were opposed by fan groups and football people but every one has worked well. If it ain't broke, don't fix it.

It'll need a change in the law and I can't see Parliament getting around to it, even if a majority of MPs would be in favour, which is questionable. Personally I'm against it but I recognise that this puts me in the minority.

Well I need to acknowledge that I've taken the easy pick in that the odds are enormously against any young player making it at any top club. If you just predict that all young players will fail to make it, you are going to be right almost every time. Even so my judgement, for what it's worth, is that there are things lacking in Nate's game, things that suggest to me that his level is below the Premier League. As I said, I like the bloke. When he was captaining our development squads he would walk on to the pitch as if he owned the place. It was awesome to see but unfortunately only rarely does his game live up to the expectations created by that natural confidence. When he returned briefly and started for the 21s in an early season game, he was comfortably the worst Chelsea player on the pitch. I hope that Nate will succeed but it'll surprise me if he does.

On the rare occasions that I give opinions based on limited viewings, I'm honest enough to highlight that fact so people can decide if they want to take those opinions even less seriously than they otherwise might. It is not a rare occasion however when I am respectful of other people's points of view, and when I'm able to accept that someone disagrees with me without feeling the need to make ill informed guesses about how and why they think as they do. I've been describing what I see as Nate's flaws since before he went on loan to Watford. I watched him play many times for the Hornets and have reported here, and elsewhere, my view that the generally favourable reaction to his time there was over generous. I've stated a number of times that I think Nate put in more poor performances for Watford than he produced good ones. I was bitterly disappointed when Nate was selected ahead of Nathan Ake for the summer 2013 tour. I was told that I was a fool because I offered the opinion that Nathan is a far better prospect, an opinion which was mocked further when Jose made his comment about Nate becoming a part of our 2014-15 squad after benefiting from one more season on loan. I suggested that the poster should wait until that actually happened before mocking. We now know of course that it didn't. I've watched Nate play many, many times for our development sides, for two loan clubs and for England age group teams. Judging from your comments you have too but it doesn't matter if you haven't, your opinion is still valid and may even turn out to be right. I can't pretend to believe something I don't however, so I repeat my view, Nate is not good enough for this club and it's time for Chelsea to encourage him to move on with his career.

I like Nate as a lad but he clearly is not Chelsea standard and needs to sort himself out a new club. He was comprehensively outplayed by Carvalho last night. Not in the sense that they went one on one but Carvalho looked a potential player who calmly gave structure to his side, Nate did not. It was a poor selection by Southgate and a decision which contributed directly to the fact that we lost.

Agreed I'm afraid. Isn't it a perfect measure of football finances now that we illustrate how poor a player looks by saying that he is only worth £10m?

The club will put on a parade if we get a point at Newcastle! :)

Or 4 even.

Wow the two City games are brilliantly placed. Right at the beginning and then the return at the start of the run in and hopefully, hopefully, hopefully sandwiched between a Champions League quarter-final and an FA Cup semi-final.

I think unofficially will be the stumbling block. The HG rules talk about players being registered with a (qualifying) club but Bertrand wasn't registered with us until he signed officially in Jan 2014.

I was describing Torres as a very ordinary player before he joined Liverpool as well as while he was there. I say this to make it clear that I'm no apologist for the man but he has been unfairly criticised for missing that chance. The ball was played slightly behind his run and with so much pace that he had no time to adjust his shape. He gets a free pass on that one from me.

None of the existing stands are 1905 originals but it's still Stamford Bridge. As for rejections, I've no idea of course but it must be reasonable to guess that, since the stadium does not have a sponsor, no potential partners have been interested. At least not at a price acceptable to Chelsea. Personally, I don't have a problem with naming rights, I hope it happens and the sooner the better. New stadium or no new stadium.

It's not about the age in and of itself. It's more about the fact that the existing name is too well established. Had Emirates Airlines bought naming rights to Highbury, everyone would have ignored it and gone right on calling the ground by its traditional name. The value of the arrangement, from the sponsors point of view, would therefore have been much reduced. On the other hand it's hard to imagine anyone calling the new ground anything other than Emirates Stadium. Indeed, if and when Arsenal need to attract a new sponsor, they may find companies reluctant to spend big because the place is so strongly associated with The Emirates. It'll be interesting to see how it goes with us if we do put up a new stadium at The Bridge. It'll be a new building for sure but it'll also be at the old ground and with, I suppose, a section of the fan base insisting on continuing to use the old name. In fact Chelsea may well want to sell a name like The XYZ Stadium at Stamford Bridge but I'd expect buyers to want to use their brand name only. If and when the time comes, I hope we manage to square that circle and get a good deal.

Irrespective of FFP changes the club will want to sell naming rights where possible. What's more I hope they succeed and that the deals are very lucrative.

Political necessity. Think of the fixture list they would face in their local federation against teams representing nations whose governments and religious authorities believe that Israel should not exist? FIFA always consider political realities as, for example, the recent policy that Russia and Ukraine should be kept apart wherever possible.

I only saw the last 25 minutes but during that time I certainly agree. Barring a couple of Harry Kane touches, all the moments of quality England produced while I watched, came from Ruben. I thought the performance was typical of him actually. Lot's of precise manipulation of the ball to get it out of his feet to create opportunities for runs, or angles for passes and always something effective on the end of it, albeit usually simple. It was an enjoyable display but, overall, it was still more of what I've been commenting on ever since Ruben came to our attention over 2 years ago. Jose talked about Ruben not working hard enough when Chelsea didn't have the ball. That comment was not wrong, but nor did it cover everything RLC needs to hear. For me Ruben doesn't work hard enough when Ruben doesn't have the ball. Virtually all of his involvements that I saw were positive but there just weren't enough of them. Granted, he no longer seems to stroll around as I used to complain about him doing but he isn't busting a gut to get into possession either. There were spells during which he occupied the '10' area, with his back to goal, drifting from one position where his teammates didn't have an angle to get the ball to him, into another position where his teammates didn't have an angle to get the ball to him. Does this add up to the lad needing to work harder, or work smarter? I suppose it's a bit of both, as usual, but I remain upbeat about Ruben. He has the talent, everything else can be learned. Two plus years ago I said Ruben needed a kick up the backside. Well, he may have had a few privately but hopefully the public one administered last week will provide the spark he needs. P.S. The post match panel were raving about him.

No that quote just says he was aware of him. Managers of big clubs are aware of everyone and run the rule over everybody. Jose has admitted that he tried to sign old slippy three times. (Good decision in my opinion.) I'd be surprised to learn that he tried to sign Cuadrado even once.

I'm aware of those quotes but, as I say, I'm taking my cue from JM's behaviour while the deal was in the offing and immediately after it was completed, not from statements made 5 months later. I'm speculating about what the manager thought at the time, not what he thinks now. As for these comments: - They may be true. They may be the efforts of a manager to be supportive of a bloke he likes. They may be the efforts of a manager to be supportive of whoever it was within the club system that instigated this deal. They may be the efforts of a manager who recognises that whoever it was that instigated the deal, wants Cuadrado persevered with. They may be a negotiation tactic; talk up the player's quality, talk down your willingness to allow him to leave. It may be all of those, some of those or none of those. I don't know, I'm only guessing but it remains my guess that Jose did not ask for this player.

Hello Fernando, I've had this conversation with someone already. I can't remember who and I'm too lazy to check. Apologies if it was you and this post is just a repeat. However... I do not believe that Cuadrado was a Mourinho signing. I say this because of the stark contrast in the way Jose spoke about his acknowleged signings during and immediately after the transfer process and the virtual silence from him while the Cuadrado deal was underway as well as when it was completed. There was no list of reasons why he wanted the player, no descriptions of conversations he'd had with the player trying to persuade him to join and no obvious delight in his body language when the deal was completed. There had been all of those with other arrivals. Compare even what Jose is now saying about Falcao with his silence over Cuadrado. Who ever it was I had the earlier exchange with wouldn't have it. He insisted I was just making excuses for Jose. Not so. I'm talking about JM's behaviour before any of those players had kicked a ball for Chelsea. Indeed, in Falcao's case before he's even signed as far as we know. Until I see contradictory evidence I'm going to continue to suspect that Cuadrado was a club signing.