WNDS

It is of course best to take everything that swirls around the internet concerning football transfers (or anything else for that matter) with a huge pinch of salt, but Di Marzio is the source that first stated that we were attempting to purchase Cuadrado; he seems to have some genuine information concerning the potential transfer. If he says that it's now looking unlikely, then in this instance I'm inclined to believe him. Cue today or tomorrow: 'Chelsea FC is delighted to announce the purchase of Juan Guillermo Cuadrado etc.....'

https://twitter.com/DiMarzio/status/558588858389233664 It seems that the potential deal for Cuadrado is stalling badly at the moment. Douglas Costa currently more likely according to Di Marzio.

Taison, Texeira, and Douglas Costa have been the 3 starting AMs for Shakhtar in the Champions League and most of the big games this season. As to whether Douglas Costa is an 'upgrade' or not, the answer is that he is probably viewed as a direct replacement for Salah as the left-footed RW in the squad, nothing more. From what I can see, he is a player better suited to our style of play than Salah is, and so might be used by Mourinho (much) more frequently than the unfortunate Salah has been. Personally, I'm a bit baffled as to why so many people are seemingly against this potential signing, given that it will still leave the door open for Reus to arrive as a cheap world-class upgrade to the first 11 in the summer. True, with Madrid (and every other club) in the running for him, it may be unlikely to happen, but that hasn't stopped tons of people on this forum from complaining that Cuadrado is a near-useless potential signing because he isn't enough of an upgrade for our starting line-up. Edit: Di Marzio (who broke the news that we are in for Cuadrado) has just tweeted his view that Douglas Costa is now looking the more likely purchase for us. Apparently Enner Valencia is our third option.

IF that is the case, then I would anticipate that Salah leaves and Douglas Costa is brought in to replace him as a left-footed RW in the squad. Despite what has happened so far this season, I'm not convinced that Mourinho is ready to let Schurrle go, and Schurrle staying on with us means that Douglas Costa being cup-tied for the CL won't matter as much as it could have.

Douglas Costa isn't really a 'workhorse'-type player; he's all flair (with average end-product).

We ARE in for him (apparently). The player himself confirms it here: http://globoesporte.globo.com/rs/noticia/2015/01/douglas-costa-admite-proposta-do-chelsea-e-diz-que-quer-sair-sonho.html

A midfield of Matic, Pogba, Cesc, Oscar and Hazard? Matic, Pogba, and Oscar are all fairly dynamic players, true, but I don't think Mourinho would ever want to have such a general lack of pace in the starting 11, particularly if Terry and Ivanovic are to remain starters themselves; the team would be too vulnerable to counters. I'm afraid if Pogba comes in, then Oscar goes out, simple as that. Oscar could be retained as a high quality squad player, but he would probably not accept such a scenario, and ultimately we would recoup about half the Pogba transfer fee with his sale.

I'm not sure how I feel about Cuadrado's potential acquisition yet. He's a proper RW with pace and dribbling/crossing/shooting ability, but his raw technique levels (ball control/passing) appear to be below Willian's, he's less physically strong than Willian is, and his workrate can hardly be superior to Willian's either. From what I have seen of his style of play (not much admittedly), he looks like the sort of player who will struggle with the physicality of the PL; the combination of excellent dribbling and decent-but-not-outstanding technique with a lack of upper body strength suggests to me a player who (similar to Schurrle) is going to lose possession A LOT during domestic games. And yet he IS a genuine RW (unlike Willian, Schurrle, Reus, Turan etc.), and that could possibly make enough of a difference for us .

Nowhere near. And given how he performed, it says everything about how poor we were as a team when in possession and trying to 'attack'.

Probably a combination of people taking the entirely lazy view that: a) Chelsea played poorly overall + b ) we didn't keep a clean sheet + c) Luis is currently reserve full-back = d) Luis was poor himself. I saw one news outlet give Ivan a 7 whilst giving Luis a 5. Lamentable stuff. Entirely reputation-based and narrative-driven. Just like last season where it took news outlets/the general football-watching public almost all season to realise that Azpi was a more than merely 'decent' LB.

Normally I feel the criticism of Mikel is overdone, and I still feel that that is the case in general, but my god he seemed DIRE today. The only reason I say 'seemed' is because surely he must have been doing SOMETHING right to convince Mourinho to let him play the entire match. He was bypassed time and time again by the simplest forward passes through our DM zone, failed to pick up his man on countless occasions, and added in a few lazy challenges and clearances for good measure. Not acceptable, and a real shame as well because I quite liked what I had seen from him in previous appearances this season.

Last season, almost ALL of his best performances were in the big games; Liverpool (home), Man Utd (home), Man City (Away), PSG (home) etc., he was immense in all of these. This season he has yet to produce to the same standard in many games generally, but he saved us (and Ivan) countless times today with his interceptions and blocking of crosses. No, he once again didn't produce going forward, but who did? Every attacker/midfielder and even some of our defenders spent much of the game playing hopeless passes and mis-controlling the ball. For me, today showed why he should remain a part of our squad in the future, if not always/often being a member of the starting 11 itself.

I thought he gave a defensive performance worthy of Azpi today, but it seems that not many are of the same opinion. I've looked around a few news outlets' ratings pages and I see 5s (!?) and 6s; on Chelsea forums, his performance is barely mentioned. Sure, he didn't do much going forward (did anyone?), but he won a huge number of duels, and almost no successful opposition attacks came down his side of the pitch. Contrast that with what was happening everywhere else on the pitch. To me, it looks like he has begun to find his feet in English football, and should now be in proper contention for a starting berth.

On the Chelsea TV live commentary they initially thought it was Luis on the receiving end of the rant, but corrected themselves and stated that it was actually Oscar. Something about him not having provided adequate support for a pass .

From what I was hearing, it seems that both did pretty well. Watford were generally kept quiet down Luis' side, and Azpilicueta attacked well down the right (although Watford did get in behind him a few times as a result of this).

I wouldn't say that it sounded as if ALL of the squad players were bad. From the commentary I was listening to, it seemed as if Zouma was excellent, Remy was very good in the 2nd half, and Mikel/Luis were decent-to-good. In fact all the players that featured seemed to be at least decent, with the exceptions of Oscar, Schurrle, and Ramires.

Personally, I think that the 'general consensus' suggestion of playing Remy (a natural striker) on the right ahead of Ivanovic (on current form) would be disastrous; he probably doesn't have the excellent defensive positioning of Willian, and this could leave Ivanovic hugely vulnerable. It might work if Azpi was at RB instead though . Your own suggested line-up and formation is interesting, but would probably require far too much of Matic as the lone DM. My own view is that if Remy were to be played as a starter, he should play in the centre of the AMs (but as more of a 'second striker' behind Costa), with Hazard and Willian on either side. This would probably only work against a fairly limited number of teams, however.

To be fair, not many players in the world have particularly good goals to long-shot ratios at all. Even many of the players reputed to be the 'best' at scoring from range tend to play the probabilities using their relatively superior shooting technique; they take tons of shots from range, and a few of these are struck well enough to go in. In Willian's case it's probably more appropriate simply to say 'a goal.... AT LAST', given that 4 of his 7 goals for us have been from range.

I thought he improved upon his past few performances quite significantly and played well today. He could easily have been dropped for this match, but (like Oscar and Ivanovic) his contribution to our general system of play is evidently valued highly enough by Mourinho to ensure that he is at least partly forgiven for the unflattering aspects of his game. This will probably continue to be the case until the team as a whole begins to struggle for goals, in which case I would imagine that Schurrle will get more starts. Willian's stats for last season actually read as 4 goals and 7 assists in all competitions, and this season he has 2 goals and 3 assists at the half-way point; he's on course for very similar totals. I would suggest that your more negative assessment of his contribution this season when compared with last season is possibly due to Willian not yet having produced a genuinely excellent and memorable performance against the better teams that we have faced this campaign. Last season he was superb (or at least very good) against Liverpool (home), Man City (away), PSG (home), and Man United (home), whilst this season his best performances have been against Villa (home), Maribor (home), and Schalke (away); only the Schalke game was a 'big' game, and that was only because of its context. Having said this, it's worth bearing in mind that all of Willian's 'big game performances' came in the second half of last season.

As I have already mentioned up-thread, I was worried that Azpi might struggle when playing on the right after all his time spent at LB. I was therefore delighted to see him play like that at RB against decent opposition. Other than the moment towards the end of the game when the excellent Carrillo got the better of him in a dangerous position, his performance was almost flawless. I particularly loved his short passing combinations and willingness to play the ball forwards; such a contrast with what he generally does with the ball when at LB.

I thought Mikel was excellent today. He was good on the ball, ambitious with his passing, reasonably solid defensively, and somehow scored a goal (yes I will say 'somehow' even though the ball was about 5cm out - this IS Mikel we're talking about). Nothing more to add really; I just thought I would post my appreciation for a good performance by a useful squad player who doesn't seem to receive much.

Luis could possibly have done better against Carrillo during the build-up for the goal, but then again, Carrillo was just having a great game in general and even left Azpi on his back-side before setting up a good chance at one point. Other than that, I though he was decent defensively, and made some great interceptions; he'll have to show a little bit more to push for a starting spot against the best teams, however. On the other hand, he was great going forward, winning us a penalty and contributing to a lot of general build-up play. Against teams that we expect to sit back against us he MUST start, and is also certainly worth a shout against teams of a similar quality and style of play to Sporting.

As I've already said, I agree with you that Luis is not quite as defensively solid as Azpi, but he is nonetheless a mostly excellent and well-rounded defender in his own right, and so long as he is used intelligently in the right games and against the right opposition, I don't really feel that we would be sacrificing all that much of our defensive solidity at all. I mean, he's hardly Marcelo, either in defense (much better) or when attacking (a fair bit worse). I just feel that Mourinho is neglecting much of the potential for tactical flexibility within out team. As far as I'm concerned, with three full-backs as good as ours, we should adopt more of a 'horses-for-courses' approach as to who plays: Teams that we expect to sit deep against us - Azpi and Luis Teams that are direct and physical - Ivan and Azpi Teams that are vulnerable in the air - Ivan and Azpi/Luis Teams that employ 'traditional' wingers (right-footers on the right/left-footers on the left) - Azpi/Ivan and Luis Teams that employ inverted wingers (e.g. Bayern and Real) - Ivan and Azpi Of course, this wouldn't always be the case, as there are other factors/tactical issues to consider outside of these simplistic match-ups that I've posted, but this type of approach would ensure that all three players get adequate and meaningful game-time AND REST. Some might not be keen on the idea of rotating the full-backs, but I'm not advocating game-by-game changes; merely that Mourinho actually bothers to change things at up at full-back when appropriate.

No, no, I agree with you that Azpi is the best of our full-backs when it comes to defending (the best of all PL full-backs in my view), and I also agree that Luis has struggled at times against the directness/physicality of some PL teams (e.g. Crystal Palace). The question isn't really 'why always Cesar?', more 'why never Luis?'. He isn't going to get to grips with the PL if he's always on the bench . Ultimately, though, I just didn't agree with you that Luis was culpable in any real/tangible way for the second goal we conceded today; if Sissoko doesn't mis-control initially, I think Luis' positioning is about as good as it's going to get in that situation.

Really harsh. We have conceded a few goals like this when Azpi (or whoever) was in exactly the same position as Luis relative to the attacker. Besides, before Sissoko mis-controlled the through-ball, Luis was in a good position to either cut out the pass to Cisse or make an attempt at blocking/rushing a shot from Sissoko himself. Cisse simply showed good anticipation in stalling his run slightly once Sissoko had let the ball fall behind him.