Viper22

Chelsea - Courtois, Ivanovic, Cahill, Zouma, Azpilicueta, Matic, Fabregas, Pedro, Willian, Hazard, Costa. Subs - Begovic, Baba, Falcao, Mikel, Kenedy, Remy, RLC. Palace - McCarthy, Ward, Dann, Delaney, Souare, McArthur, Cabaye, Zaha, Sako, Puncheon, Wickham. Subs - Mariappa, Bolasie, Hennessey, Chung-yong, Gayle, Mutch, Ledley.

Good player at Wolfsburg but I don't think he'll be anywhere near as good in England as some are suggesting. Of course he's young and can develop but I just don't think he's strong enough both on and off the ball and I don't think he performs well enough when put under the pressure of teams that press you constantly high up the pitch. IMO he'll struggle from the hard working mid/high table EPL teams the same way Fabregas does with the much reduced time he'll have on the ball. We'll have to wait and see, but i've got a funny feeling he might well be a bit of a flop at City that we'll all be looking at retrospectively saying "he's just not a PL player" come the end of the season.

Training kits have looked great this year. In sharp contrast to the dogshit we've got as kits.

If Baba is indeed out then our next best CB is Jake Clarke-Salter and next best FB is Ola Aina. Jay DaSilva the only other one that could be a possiblity. Tbh though I think Jose will just put Baba on the bench and have him as our only defender on there and just pray we don't get an injury. He often only has 1 defender on the bench anyway tbh.

Due to worrying increase in injuries/suspensions/lack of fitness Ivanovic is going to have to begrudgingly start this game IMO. Bolasie vs him might well be a bloodbath though. --------------------Courtois-------------------- -Ivanovic---Zouma---Cahill---Azpilicueta- --------------Matic-----Fabregas------------- -----Pedro--------Willian--------Hazard----- ---------------------Costa----------------------- Subs: Begovic, Baba, Mikel, RLC, Traore, Remy, Falcao.

Cuadrado would hit the deck before the game even started. Ramires would do a lot of running but offer nothing else. Fabregas will break people down but flat out refuse to ever deliver the finishing shot/blow. Cahill would back away from all conflicts off a cliff. Courtois would be sold down the river by Ivanovic. Matic would spend all his time trying to protect Terry, Ivanovic and Cahill and end up losing because of it. Hazard would be doing brilliantly before being chopped to the ground by everyone for being too good. Oscar would be good at the start of the fight, but fade badly. Willian would be good at the end of the fight, relying entirely on stamina early on. The final 2 would be the 2 hardest members of our team: Ivanovic and Costa. Costa would be winning but then Mourinho would walk out from behind a tree, shoot Costa in the head and say the immortal words "No-one drops Branislav. Not even me.".

This is the polar opposite to us respecting a player's wishes (see: Cech) and the money involved is so ridiculous that it changes things. The transfer request has made it clear that Stones wants to leave and Martinez is essentially saying he doesn't care what Stones wants. This would be like Real Madrid bidding like £120M for Costa or £160M for Hazard. I love both of those players but if we received bids like that I (and I would wager most Chelsea fans on here) would be all for us accepting and using that ridiculous amount of money to sign all of the targets we required and a replacement that would probably be almost as capable.

Feel really bad for Stones who's done everything the right way (played when the manager told him, didn't say anything to the public, no agent shenanigans, no mysterious 'injuries' and no claiming his head isn't at the club) because he's been treated like an absolute mug by Everton and Martinez. It's nothing personal for him but I really hope he has a really poor season now and gets sold next summer (even if it isn't to us) for like £10-15M and Everton will be left wondering "what if" like Swansea are now after they decided not to sell Michu for £20-25M after that 1 season wonder he had. I've said it before and I say it again, never EVER loan Everton a player ever again and if both them and another club want one of our players always accept the offer from the other club. If it's just them after one of our players then double the asking price and still make them wait on us accepting it. This has been Levy levels of Douchebaggery from Martinez and has been Liverpool fan levels of Scumbaggery from the fans. Really poor show from everyone involved at Everton and I hope they look back one day and are ashamed at their actions.

Good draw, considering some of the awkward ones out there for Saints, Arsenal, Spurs, Villa and Swansea.

It's bloody close between Liverpool and Spurs tbh. Liverpool for the forever victims bullshit and the "we deserve" crap. Spurs because Daniel Levy and every fan but 1 i've met is a complete tosser. Utd fans are almost always fucking annoying because they are almost always sheep (hence why they support United in the first place) misinformed and arrogant. But I respect the club for what they've achieved and begrudgingly respect Ferguson. City I have no problem with. Competitive rivals but don't particularly dislike any of their players (only Nasri gets on my tits a bit), most fans i've met have been decent and tbh it's only the manager that is a prick IMO. Never had that much of a problem with Everton but their fans arrogance and Martinez's antics over the last 2 years are starting to move them up the list quickly. Arsenal are a hard one. I enjoy seeing them lose probably the most and the biggest dickhead fans I know are mostly Arsenal (or Newcastle) fans. But I still can't bring myself to hate them as much as Spurs or Liverpool because they actually have decent players and have won the league relatively recently so have something to shout about unlike the Liverpool or Spurs morons. Wenger is a complete knob though and can do one and I still don't like the club or fans one bit. Oh and lets not forget QPR who have undoubtedly the scummiest fans on the face of the Earth. So for me: 1. Liverpool/Spurs 3. QPR 4. Man Utd 5. Arsenal 6. Everton 7. West Ham

Yeah. Like the Ben Davies and Gylfi Sigurdsson, Ashley Cole and William Gallas, Andy Cole and Keith Gillespie, Zlatan Ibrahimovich and Samuel, Jermain Defoe and Bobby Zamora, James Beattie and Kevin Davies, Fabio Cannavaro and Fabian Carini, Francesco Coco and Clarence Seedorf & Nemanja Matic and David Luiz swap deals all happened in video games or our heads? Why do people make such stupid comments so often...

Dp

Similar to how the Pedro to Chelsea rumours were bullshit too eh?

If anyone doesn't know quite what Pogba would offer us... Go back and watch Lampard circa 2005 (when he was one of if not the best player in the world) and see the goals he scored for us and the style he played. That is what Pogba would give us. Yaya Toure esque pace and power coupled with outstanding finishing and a penchant for scoring outrageous goals from 20+ yards from nowhere. He'd be a game winner. He'd be such a key player and would most importantly shore up a struggling midfield as he's more than competent at defending when required. Now that we've signed Pedro, Pogba would be the no.1 signing i'd want right now. (Was Reus before but if Pedro plays anywhere near as good as he did today for the rest of the season that RW problem is very much solved).

A 2 footed winger that can actually finish?

Because he has scored in the Championship, that's no guarantee that he'll score in the PL. Hence why the PL loan to show that he can. If he can, he returns to the club and replaces the outgoing Falcao when his loan finishes. Then he'll get his chance, he knows this and it's the best way of doing it.

Good player, potential to be great but it's only potential. No way he's worth anywhere near £39M. £15M max an tbh I wouldn't want us to pay that as we already have 3 strikers +Bamford and Solanke. No chance he'd get a game. If we're gonna spunk that much money on a young player it would be a much better idea to aim it in the direction of Stones (as we're doing) or someone like Tielemans, Berardi or Gimenez.

Fantastic render mate. Good god can you imagine being an opposition player walking out onto that pitch on a Champion's League game night? So so intimidating. Also, I know they're louder than our support but the roof reminds me of the Millenium Stadium on Welsh Rugby matches i've been to and holy shit is it loud. Would really get a good echo for the noise going and make it even louder when the crowd gets behind the players during big games.

Are you seriously suggesting that Courtois and Hazard aren't world class.... Really? And also Hazard cost £32M, that's expensive (turned out brilliantly though). Also, I really hope you're not saying that the signing of the 'reject' Fabregas was a poor piece of business. He got 19 assists in the league last year and 5 goals and 24 assists in all competitions. If you seriously think that's anything but awesome then.... I just don't know what to say.

Fixed.

Aha no I don't think so. Would prefer Pedro over Hulk atm. Wonder who our new Hulk will be (now we've got Falcao too) in that we'll apparently be forever pursuing them but never get them? Maybe Pogba .

Arsenal get linked with Cavani and Benzema every transfer window lol.

You're either trolling or just plain stupid. Check the mugshots thread if you like. Either way i'm done with this.