MrExcalibur100

Being out of the FA cup is definitely a blessing in disguise.

We only leave London THRICE from now till the end of the season. Hull, Leicester and WBA. Pretty incredible stat. I can't remember something similar happening, at least to us. We have 8 more home games and 6 more away games. Of those 6 away games, all of them except away to Arsenal and West Ham are vs the 3 bottom sides (Leicester, QPR and Hull) and to 15th placed West Brom. Yes, they're fighting for their lives, but I'll rather we face these teams than top 6 teams away from home. There's a reason why they are in the relegation zone, because they're crap. We face all top 10 sides at home, including Man United, Liverpool and Southampton.We're 7 points clear of our nearest rivals, who are closer to 4th placed Man United than they are to us. We have to lose two games and draw one for them to overtake us.Man City still have to go away to Stoke, Man United, Liverpool and a resurgent Tottenham. Even assuming they stop dropping points at home from now till May, that's a very very tough away schedule. We have the best squad of players and by far the best manager. Weirder things have happened, yes, but taking all those bullet points into consideration, it will be an absolute travesty if we don't win it from here now. On paper and in reality, the 1st half of the season with all those tough matches away from home we've had was much more difficult than this 2nd half. Unless we get dicked over by the refs, we really should be (deserving) Champions this time.

So because Oscar has a couple of more goals than players like Koke and Isco, he's a better player than them? Right now, he's not even close to the likes of Eriksen and Cazorla, crazy to put his name in the same sentence as Koke. I don't get the obsession with using far-flung statistics, stripped of actual context to justify player A being better than player B. It's so, so silly as these aren't even direct comparisons. Anyway........... Oscar needs to understand that this team has grown up. This team is now destined to become Champions, and that means there's no more room for mediocre and inconsistent performances. That's so last season. And age is no longer an excuse. Look at Eriksen, same age, same position. A reliable match winner for his team. Oscar has only turned up this season when he's had Fabregas to hold his hand. Mourinho rarely trusts him in the big games as he's always shit in them. Maybe we'll just have to accept sooner or later the guy isn't good enough to be a starting number 10 for a club like Chelsea. People keep talking about how important he is for the "balance on the team" and all these abstruse attributes he supposedly brings to the table. No one can deny he's a hard-worker, but we already have hard-workers in our team. Remember just how "crucial" players like Ramires and MIKEL were before we replaced them with better players? Let's not pretend that we cannot do better. When your number 10 can't even make simple, decisive passes, protect the ball, make right decisions and dictate the tempo vs inferior opposition, then he isn't a good number 10. How many times have we seen Oscar ruin a simple attacking move because he lacks the vision and composure to make a simple forward pass? Oscar reminds me a bit of Luiz. Good footballer, but lacks the attributes required for his position. I'm not saying we should sell Oscar, because he's a talented player, but we if Jose is planning on continuing with the 4-2-3-1 in the future, we should be looking at signing a more creative playmaker for the 10 position. Or we can go for something more balanced and solid, i.e go all out for Pogba and pair him next to Matic and Cesc in a 4-3-3.

Who cares. 7 points is just as good as 8

Another underrated aspect of his game is his movement off the ball.

Quick question guys and gals. Is Cuadrado the first Colombian to ever play for Chelsea? I can't think of any other right now.

Or even swapping Oscar with Willian. Can you imagine the pace and skill there with Cuadrado - Willian - Hazard? Insane.

Nah, just that he wanted to win that more than any other. I remember when we won it, he wore a Champions League training jacket for a couple of games straight.

Again, we simply decided not to play in the 2nd half. Not even a failed attempt at play. All of our actions when we had possession were designed not to try to score but instead to give them back the ball and hope for some optimistic counter-attack. It's not an anomaly, it's not the first time we've looked good in the 1st half of a big game and then we sit on the result in the 2nd half, so the excuse of the Pool game doesn't wash. Even against Arsenal at the Bridge in the 2nd, this season, we did the exact same thing, only that it wasn't brought up because we won 2-0. Believe it or not, we can play better. We need to rely less on instinct and individual brilliance of certain players, because that can only take you so far.

You didn't read what I typed. I said the dying minutes of the 1st half was our best period of the game and that we immediately went defensive from minute 1 of the 2nd half. Are you saying players have more energy in the dying stages of the 1st half than in the first few minutes of the second? wow.

That's besides the point, Mr. Zolayes. First and foremost, I want what's best for my football club. If I feel the manager continues to employ the exact same tactics in the big matches, the same tactics that cost us valuable points in the league, away to United and Arsenal and cost us in the CL vs Atletico eventually, I have to question him, the same way I question players I feel aren't pulling their weight (Willian) or aren't good enough (Schurrle). Support the manager, yes, but if I feel he deserves to be criticized, then I'll do just that, despite others making excuses for him or just following him blindly. Being a Chelsea fan is first and foremost looking after the best interests of the club before any player or manager or even before Roman Abramovich, Zolayes.

That's not a solution because my problem is not with Chelsea. I'm merely highlighting the tactical limitations of our manager. Mourinho is one of the best managers in the world, but believe or not, he has his problems, as was evidenced in the 2nd half of this game and several other big games this season and last season. Big games that cost us titles. To question Mourinho is not to question Chelsea Football club, Zolayes. You're better than this, Zolayes.

Yes, his antics on the touchline are more entertaining than his team.

It absolutely is, since it was basically from minute 1 of the 2nd half and since we actually played our best football in the last 10 mins of the 1st half. Human physiology suggests you're more likely to be tired in the closing stages of the 1st than in the opening stages of the 2nd half. Mourinho has no excuses. I sense some arrogance in your second sentence, which isn't surprising coming from you. Yet it is deeply misplaced and you fail to sense the irony of your post. Courtois all of a sudden hitting long balls with 100% alacrity, our defenders not even attempting to play from the back anymore, regardless of limitations. In clear contrast to the 1st half. If you think that wasn't Mourinho, then well.... wow.

No. We played always attacking football in every game in Zola's time. What we lacked was a wealthy owner to take us to the next level. We also pretty attack minded in the 70's as well, so I hear. We played attacking football under Ancelotti. Under him, I believe we played the most complete football in the Abramovich era, but the team Mourinho built was already starting to weaken badly in the 2011 season. I remember complete performances like this one, were we went to difficult grounds and imposed our game on teams. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GprcTAFLQCw Then all of a sudden, instead of backing him with the responsibility of building his own team, Abramovich sacked him. That was Roman's biggest mistake ever. He sacked the best manager we've ever had aside from Vialli. I credit Mourinho a lot with team building, resiliance and with the winning mentality he instilled in Chelsea. He built our first world class team, that team was built for him and built in his image. That team wasn't designed to play beautiful football, but to overpower teams. And when Mourinho faced a manager that could be as pragmatic as he was in Benitez, he failed. Twice. I also credit Mourinho with building this amazing team. In conjunction with Emenalo and our scouts, that's the best thing he's done since he returned. But you just get the feeling this team is not built in his image. His tactical strength is in organizing defenses and counter attacking, not in playing possession football and designing sophisticated attacks. It's been that way all his career and he is not as complete tactically as he'll like himself to be advertised. This team was built by Abramovich for Guardiola and Guardiola snubbed him and chose Bayern. Mourinho wasn't even the 1st, 2nd or 3rd choice because of his tactics and controversial nature. It's obvious our wealthy benefactor wants this team to play attacking football, bring through our own youth and still win titles. People seem to forget that his opinion on things also counts.

Come off it, mate. Of course we did. I have a lot of belief and trust in the quality of our players and City were not exactly in the best of shape coming into this game. 2 defeats 2 draws. No win since 4th of January. Rusty Aguero and no Yaya Toure.

The man won league titles and league cups in Germany and took his team to the CL final. He had all his good players bought from him. He has nothing to prove, mate.

Regardless of how we play I'm at least excited about zouma. Surely that's a cause to be merry? (1) Nothing wrong with highlighting the shortcomings of the manager, mate. Believe me, I'm far from miserable, just fed up with the incredibly negative approach. Mourinho ruined the game, not as a spectacle, because I can give two fucks if the neutrals enjoyed the game or not, but as a contest, because in the 2nd hald, he put our players in a position were it became impossible for them to win the match. That shows a lack of faith in his players and a lack of tactical flexibility. (2) Yeah, Zouma is something to smile about. He's still raw in some of his actions, but he's absolute quality. I'm surprised how good he's been in these last two games actually. Let's hope he maintains his level. So credit to Mourinho for dropping Cahill.

For me it's pretty simple. Whatever Mourinho told the team in the 2nd half clearly didn't work. We came out looking far worse and tried to protect the lead, potentially settling for either a draw or a loss. I just read a stat that this match was the lowest amount of shots we've had in a game since 2003/2004. We had 3 shots in the game, a big fat zero in the 2nd half. That's shots, not even shots on target. How is that even possible? This is not solely because of the fatigue or because Costa and Fabregas didn't play. We had our best spell of the match in the last minutes of the first half for god's sake! Then we come out playing like THAT from minute 1 of the 2nd half? We didn't even try to win for even till say minute 60? I'm not buying the fatigue excuse, sorry. Mourinho again used the same tactic he uses in big games (which is odd since chasing the ball saps more energy) and we had to settle for the point. Is that a tactical performance to be praised or noted? No it is not.

It's widely reported, just the same way it's widely reported he craved the Champions League more than any other. It also matches with the profile of players we've bought ever since we won the Champions League. Technical players ahead of workman like, mechanical types. Everybody wants to see good football, but you're right we can't expect it every game. Fair enough. But from minute 1 of the 2nd half? Why not at least play for say, the first 20 mins of the 2nd half till minute 65 and then if we haven't scored and the fatigue is kicking in, then just pack it up and try and hold on. And the excellent result is WINNING not holding on for draws at home for 45 mins.

I never said I wished for him to be sacked. I said if he doesn't win either the PL or CL, then he'll be sacked. Myth. The football is only good in spurts and it's only good vs teams we are so vastly to superior to, so we play with more freedom and less restriction from the manager. We've arguably played more poor football than good football this season. There have been quite a few games this season were we have had 0 to 1 shot on target for the whole of 90 mins. Look at that 2nd half in particular and compare it to the 1st. We at least tried to attack them and when we did, we scored. In the 2nd half, you expect the manager to have some tactical output on the way his team approaches it. Instead, what we got was Mourinho's tactical input having a negative impact on our play. Courtois was no longer going short, our defense was no longer trying to play from the back. Now it was only hopeless long balls to nobody in particular, trying to play on the counter which as to be expected, NEVER materialized. Again, Mourinho had a negative impact on the way we went about the 2nd half. We settled for either a draw or loss. We were never going to win unless we got incredibly lucky.

He cares more about his career and personal glory than he does about us. He's selfish. Unbelievable player but it's time to move on from Lampard.

That's just my opinion , an opinion the owner of the club also shares. No need to get defensive like a little bitch. If you like the way we played in the 2nd half, that's fine by me. Let's pretend we never play that way and it's only an oddity or anomaly because Costa and Fabregas were not there. Those two were there at the Etihad and what happened exactly? We played like dinosaurs, defending for 90 mins, like a pub side. The investment isn't matching the football. If we don't win the league or CL this season, he'll be gone, whether you like it or not.

Many of our fans won't want to accept that, but with each passing game we play like that, the desire to move on to another club and to another manager increases. He's one of the greatest talents of his generation, if not the greatest. He deserves a better platform to show his ability, not in spurts against mid table sides. He won't be able to realize his potential in this club unless something changes.

That's why I don't take what he says seriously anymore. It's shameful he had us playing like that today and on other occasions as well, like a small pub team.