MrExcalibur100

It's easier to be "consistent" when you aren't relied upon for goals and creativity. When you aren't double-marked and when you don't have the shit kicked out of you with alacrity with zero protection from PL refs. Over the course of a full season? Azpi wasn't even a starter till November, how is that a full season? I LOVE him, but please. And is Azpilicueta anymore consistent than Cahill or Terry (who by the way have really been consistent for the entire season and are more crucial because their back-up is David fucking Luiz) this season? I've watched all the games and I say no.

That's where I disagree. Without Azpilicueta, we have Ashley Cole. Since when did Ashley become such a bum that he is a unable to do a job when called upon? Just last season, we were calling him the best LB in the world. Has he become a bad player that he can't do a similar job to Azpi, god forbid he gets injured? Saying the defense will "crumble" is a huge exaggeration in line with some people on the Azpi thread calling for him to be this club's captain. Many people are overrating the guy all of a sudden, while underrating our star performer, Eden. And if Hazard is our best player by a country mile and if he's our best player this season then he has to win the award. It's simple logic. But because the likes of Cahill and Azpiliecueta deserve recognition, that's why I want them to win Player's player of the year award, not Player of the year. That belongs to Eden. The award is not for most improved player, fan's favourite, best professional or hardest worker, but best player.

Another thing is that he's a match-winner and a big game player. He was the star against European Champions, Bayern, though he spent majority of the game playing on the counter and chasing shadows. The star against Liverpool and his wonder goal sparked the comeback. Was unplayable in that classic game vs City. Superb against Gala as well. He also won us the points against the likes of Hull, Norwich, Swansea, Schalke and so on. If not for him, we will struggle to make top four. Some say he was "poor" from Aug-November but wasn't the Bayern match in these months? Norwich, Cardiff, Schalke, West Brom all in these months too. Was he also "poor" these games? The reality is that all our attacking players were suffering because we were still struggling to adapt to Jose's ideas and tactics. Remember how the media was already saying Jose had lost it and stuff. Hazard was getting double, tripled teamed by some teams because these teams could see we were struggling to play any sort of cohesive football and shafted our greatest creative threat. Martinez was the first coach to realize this. Also, Bale was anonymous for the first half of the season when he won Spurs POTY and league POTY, but that didn't stop Spurs fans and the PL from unanimously voting for him. Spurs fans could have easily voted for Vertognhen because he was consistent throughout, but they voted for their best player and match winner, why can't we? It will be a great shame if Hazard doesn't get recognition by the fans of this football club after his amazing year. If he doesn't win the award then what chance does he have of winning the big individual awards? It's funny how some people go for Hazard as PL POTY but these same people go for someone else for CFC POTY. Mata won this award back to back after having two inferior (yes) seasons compared to Hazard's this season. The boy for some reason is getting under-appreciated by our fans and it upsets me. I also feel deep down that he will be very upset if he doesn't win Chelsea POTY. Winning this is very important to his development as the face of the CFC brand because of the media attention such an award gets. The kid doesn't even get the attention he deserves yet compared to some of his overrated age-mates (Gotze, Neymar). It will be bizzare if Hazard is in the premier league team of the year and Azpilicueta is not then Azpilicueta wins CFC POTY. Many people on twitter are voting for Azpilicueta. I GET Azpilicueta, I appreciate his work in an unfamiliar position. He is an AMAZING fullback, but he is not our best player this season and more importantly, he is NOT a match-winner, mostly because of the position he plays. I was calling for him to be our RB early in the season when he couldn't even get into the team. I think we would be a top 4 team without Azpi in the team but we won't be one without Hazard. I also don't see what makes a guy like Cahill any more or less deserving than Azpilicueta, tbh. Azpi was not even a starter in the team till November. Hazard should be Chelsea's Player of the year and Azpilicueta should be the Player's player of the year. That is fair and just to both guys. http://www.chelseafc.com/player-of-the-year (Votes)

It would be a great shame if our best player doesn't win the Chelsea POTY award. Like I've suspected all along since he joined us, Hazard has become a victim of his own greatness. It seems some people are never satisfied with his contribution. He can't have a "good" game anymore. It's either he has to be amazing or "inconsistent". Also, some of our fans have become fairly paranoid about him leaving the club even though he's shown nothing buy loyalty to us since he joined, even kissing the badge against Liverpool (whatever that means nowadays). Invariably, he gets blamed for such meaningless things such as wearing a PSG jersey and the comments about his wife deciding on his future, though it was clearly said in jest. What most people choose not to realize is that most of it is garbage fueled by the French media who are desperate for a player of his calibre to return to the French league, which he dominated. Now to may main point. Hazard has scored 17 goals this season. More goals than the likes of Ribery, Robben, Neymar, Sanchez, Pedro, Di Maria and just 1 less than Reus and Bale have. All these world-class wingers play in easier leagues too and none of them are the undisputed stars of their team. They share the attacking workload with players of similar quality. Also, these players play in leagues and for teams that make life easier for attacking players to bolster their stats in. The same can't be said about Hazard with Chelsea this season. Hazard has created an incredible (95) chances for his teammates, the highest of any player in Europe's top 5 leagues and he's not even a playmaker like the Ozil's, and Silva's! What's even more astonishing about this statistic is that only 8 of these chances have been converted to assists. This says a lot about our wastefulness in front of goal and our poor quality of strikers, specifically Torres this season. It also represents our poor early season style of play or lack thereof, where we struggling to open up lanes for the attacking players and the passing was slow and ponderous. Of course, the inclusion of Matic has improved our playing style a lot as the guy can dictate play from deep and his passes (mostly vertical) are played with ferocious pace and intent. Consider that Hazard had 20 assists last season, though admittedly, it took him 60+ games to do that. Now if Hazard played for a team that had a striker, he would probably have had 20 assists in 40+ games this season, a number that matches his extraordinary creative outlay. Then maybe the ignorant people who think the "assists" stats tells you all you need to know about a player's creative output would have a rethink. You hear some clueless Liverpool fans say that Luis Suarez is a more creative player than Hazard because he has more assists than him.

need, need, need, need........maybe we should just work with what we have and stop complaining. Besides, we already have van Ginkel for the pivot and a lot of creative players that play behind the strikers.

Like I thought, an empty barrel. Nothing of note to contribute. That doesn't stop you from shooting down other people's views as "shite though. Me .and you are clearly different as I would never do that, not even over the internet and not even if I completely disagree with a post. It's called common sense and courtesy. Things you apparently lack.

Where exactly is the final vote count?

I think more people generally voted for Hazard than they did for Azpilicueta. The thread should also have a poll to make it less confusing.

Cannavaro won the award because he was Italy's best player and a lynch pin in defense. I remember that vividly, because I watched majority of the games in the world cup. He was like a monster. He seemed to win every headed ball, though he wasn't the tallest and his awareness in the box was immense. There was no other Italian player who was better than him. Ironically, Zizou was player of the tournament despite headbutting someone in the final. And as for your "modern day football fan" drivel. You obviously don't have a clue on what I know and don't know about football. I was only pointing out that a player who is relied upon to score goals and create goal-scoring chances is more valuable than a full-back who is tactically restricted from over-lapping a lot during games. I also feel that it's easier for such a full-back to be more consistent in his performances. You clearly don't know what the footballing term "match-winner" means. I wasn't undermining Azpi's contribution at all, but stating something that any "knowledgeable football fan" would at least relate with even if he/she completely disagrees with. Maybe if you didn't dismiss my opinion as "shite", just maybe I wouldn't have to get into a long-winded argument on something irrelevant.

Nice constructive criticism. Feel free to agree or disagree, but if you can't offer any valuable retort, then your opinion to me is a complete waste of time. A world class striker for example is more valuable than a world class full-back. A world class striker gets more individual awards than a world-class full-back. How many full-backs can ever win the ballon d'Or? A world class striker is a match-winner because he scores goals while is world-class full-back can rarely be one. World-class strikers earn more than world-class full-backs. We would struggle for 4th without Hazard while we won't without Azpilicueta. That's the reality of football. I'm not even trying to under-mine Azpi's contribution this season. I just stated my opinion on why Hazard is (and should be) the overwhelming favourite. Take for example Cahill. I don't think Azpi has been better than him this season. I think their performance level have been roughly equal, but if you ask me to choose between the two for POTY, I will choose Cahill, because he is more important to the team. If we didn't have Cahill, we would have been forced to play Luiz at CB and I somehow doubt that our defensive record would have been anywhere near as good as it is now. We would also have dropped more points/lost more matches. Conversely, if we didn't have Azpi, we have Ashley Cole. And while Ash has been underwhelming on occasion ( that rib injury he had didn't help), we all know what he is capable of defensively. He is a much better defender than Luiz. Less error prone too. I think our performance level would have been more or less the same with Cole as LB. That's just how I see it.

It's easier to be more "consistent" when you're a fullback who is sometimes glued to John Terry as opposed to a winger who is relied on for goals and creativity and who gets double-marked in almost every game. I think the player of the year is definitely Hazard as he has comfortably been our best player this season, though Matic would have given him a run for his money had he arrived earlier. Besides, there is only so much impact a full-back can have in deciding a game. A full-back can hardly if ever be a match-winner. Hazard is a match-winner and has won us games on his own this season. We would struggle for top 4 this season without his amazing contribution. Conversely, I doubt we would struggle for top 4 without Azpi in the team. But I hope in the "official" Chelsea POTY awards that Azpi or Cahill win the Players' player of the year award because they deserve that. But Hazard is definitely the POTY. It would be silly if he gets shunned by the league and then us for the individual awards when he is obviously more than deserving.

http://plainsofalmeria.co.uk/2014/03/26/joses-midfield-machine-2-0/

Apparently he was already feeling his calf in the warm-up. No wonder he had a couple of un-Edenlike moments in the match before he came off.

Hopefully he'll be back for the CL semi's. That's either on the 22/23 and the Liverpool game is on the 27th. It's a big blow. The only negative of tonight.

Now we have a player that is actually really good with the free-kick taking lark.

Honestly, I was disappointed with it in parts today. Maybe they were nervous, but I expected more noise at certain moments in the game today. I guess it's a big club London thing. The atmosphere at Arsenal is nothing special too. Way too many tourists in attendance nowadays.

Immense game today. Heroic even. I love it when a player plays for the shirt and is willing to die on the pitch to accomplish his mission. He was up against Matuidi, Verratti, Motta and Cabaye, but stood up to them all.

Still the best in the business for me. Absolutely world class keeper and over the years has surpassed Schmeichel as the greatest keeper in premier league era. How could anyone doubt him after what he's done for us in that CL run in 2012? In the CL final? In the Super Cup even this season? Even Guardiola said "What a keeper" in his post-match presser. Let's stop pretending that the Neuer's and Courtois' of this world don't make errors. Neuer was average last season and rarely even gets tested in Bundesliga. Courtois, believe it or not makes mistakes too...... Courtois will one day succeed Cech but not yet. Cech is still our number 1.

His positioning and movement skills were already obvious even from those pre-season games in Thailand and Malaysia. Now he's added muscle and is no longer easily brushed off the ball. Looks like a really awesome player now.

The WINNING mentality of Chelsea is just unbelievable. It bears little consequence that we're building a new team. Hazard, Oscar, Willian, Azpi, Schurrle have never even played in the CL quarter final before but they come out and play like absolute warriors. It's what Drogba was talking about in a post-match interview after we won the CL in Munich. Passing the winning mentality to the next generation of Chelsea players. It's not just about talent and quality, it's about straining every sinew in your body to win and win at all costs and there's no team better at that than Chelsea. It's been that way since Mourinho's first spell at the club. The nights in Munich and Barca. We've seen shades of that tonight. The younger ones are learning the CHELSEA WAY quickly. So proud of my team tonight.

Where are my fellow Blues who wanted Courtois to replace Cech. Courtois is very good no doubt, but Cech has proven yet again to be number 1 at The Bridge.

"celebrating" indeed. Lol

Luiz WTF are you doing to Azpi??? LOL Anyway, FUCKKKKKKKK YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

He's been one of our best players really.

The fans in the stadium are so pessimistic. If you aren't going to give your all and chant the team in a must-win knock out tie, then don't go. Very disappointed in them.