MrExcalibur100

That's bull. Robben, Hazard and Ribery are clearly superior to Sanchez and Di Maria is also better. As good as anyone my foot. The amusing fact is how you say it so matter of factly.

I don't understand what you're talking about, mate. I'm not sure who you're referring to .

The demise of Diego Costa has of course been greatly exaggerated.

Hazard has spent most of his Chelsea career playing left wing but he's been brilliant as a 10. Hazard, playing mostly as a 10 had something like 22 goals and 21 assists in Ligue 1 combined with numerous performances of the unplayable variety in his last season at Lille. It's a bit of an aberration to even consider James battling out with him. He's a vastly superior player.

Pretty much.

You're assuming Dani Alves (the younger incarnation, not this one) was as bad at defending as Marcelo was. Or Carlos. They weren't.

That's not the point I was making. Look, defenders who play for Madrid, Barcelona and Bayern have an easier life because they get tested far less in their league. The ball doesn't go as quick from penalty box to penalty box as in the premier league. Marcelo won't get away with his defending in a team like Chelsea were he's required to defend more. You're making an assumption I didn't. Azpilicueta is also a better fullback than Marcelo. I'm not breaking it down into "attacking full-back" / "defensive full-back" , and even if you want to, the latter always takes precedence because DEFENDERS are called that for a reason. If you want to debate that Marcelo is a better attacking full back than Luis, then I'll give it to you. He's probably the best attacking left back in the world, he suits Madrid and La Liga's style and that's why he's been a regular for almost a decade. Luis is better because he's the whole package. And as the whole package, Marcelo is inferior to Filipe Luis and Azpilicueta. There's a reason why Ancelotti (like Jose) trusted Coentrao with Robben in the CL semi-final and not Marcelo because he knew he'll get slaughtered. I won't bother debating it anymore anyway. I know who I'll rather have in my team.

I didn't mind when City signed him and we didn't. A lot of physical power but very error prone player.

Marcelo is a very good defender because he plays in a league and for a team where his defensive ability or lack thereof doesn't get called to question a lot. In most of the big games, Mourinho always played Coentrao ahead of Marcelo because he knew he was a better defender. Just look at Marcelo's performance vs Germany in the World Cup, a complete farce. I'm not saying Marcelo is a mediocre player, because he isn't, he's a very good player, brilliant in attack, poor in defense. He's not just a good defender. A bit like David Luiz. Ultimately and relevant to the thread, no way he's a better defender than Filipe Luis.

It's just one game and he was up against a tactically disorganised Barcelona side. No one tracked back to help Dani Alves, (a player on decline). Marcelo for all his brilliance going forward is still a very poor man to man defender. I won't get excited over one game against a tactically poor defense.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/football/teams/chelsea/11187875/Chelsea-midfielder-Eden-Hazard-prepares-to-face-Manchester-United-with-the-world-at-his-feet.html

Honestly, both teams are so open defensively, it's beyond a joke. Benzema hits the post twice with all the space in the world and with no pressure whatsoever.

https://vine.co/v/OhFViag5nQl Laughable, comedy defending by Real Madrid. Our attack will seriously damage their defense if we faced them.

0-1 Neymar after 4 mins. I'm going Real 2-3 Barcelona.

Lollalelli. The new Nando Torres!! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAAA!!! Scouse bastards! Anyway, Clasico time. Off to the La Liga thread.

Literally everything, everything about this season has been perfection so far possibly except Lamps denying us all 3 points. Amazing.

Now time for us to handle our business.

They've been playing good football most of this season, tbf.

So, so close to 2-0 ffs, West Ham!

Actually, looking at Ronaldo's scoring record, it's actually better than I thought, ffs. He's already at the 20 goal mark and you can't argue with that. He's definitely better right now and deservedly so but my money is still on Messi to outclass him in the Clasico.

If you're basing this off of last season's performances, then I'll have to agree but Messi has been in incredible form this season and not just "slowly finding his feet" but bang right out the gates. He's scoring goals and creating chances for his team left, right and centre. Ronaldo's goal-scoring is more eye-catching and defies words but he's not the creative force Messi has been. Ronaldo perhaps shades it because his side have faced better teams in La Liga this season than Barcelona but not by that much at all.

And what do you base that off of, Alex? I don't see much difference in performance levels between the two players this season and IMO, Messi has a greater chance of making the decisive impact in the Clasico than Ronaldo has.

"You have to finish a game of 90 minutes with three shots. It’s not possible you play 90 minutes in the position you play without three shots." - This is the message Mourinho communicated to Willian. I hope Mourinho communicated the exact same thing to Hazard as well. Just dropping this hear without wanting to start a tiresome debate.

What about from individual player perspective? It's mostly best XI not balance.