Rhino's Skin

Cs is just a friendly like any other preseason. 8Aug , 10 Aug in Turkey plus Sociadad midweek before weekend 1 in this season just gone actually Which started on the 16th. So could have been 4 games in 8 days including travelling. When these games arranged we didnt know Burnley was going to be moved to Monday from Saturday

The other losses were in cups actually .

The Fiorentina match is the more important one with when it is being played. Finishing touches to the preseason and friendlies just like the Sociadad one last year 3 days before weekend 1 of the new season.

RAWK are allegedly smashing this poll and getting behind Coutinho in their droves. Our votes will be split

also, when other players asked hime to stop his play acting that the fans were getting on his back for

he said that he had done well for 60 mins and he didnt want to ruin the performance

Made sense to me when Jose ecplained why

dont think Drogba would in a joint team...he was pretty poor in the first 2 seasons we bought him and wasnt exactly a fans favourite. Costa would walk into that side over him,

Think the premier league was easier back then......but at the end of the day, how many and which players would get into the 2004 side from this lot.

Think you will find they lost 5 or 6 games compared to 3 with this team

I disagree and on current form reckon it has a 0-0 or possibly a 1-1 written all over it 8 or 9 times out of 10.The defence of 04/05 was outstanding but I also beleive the majority of teams in the premier league were not as strong as they are nowadays. So therefore easier to defend against....since then especially in the last few years, all the teams have money and even those teams near the bottom have decent first elevens they can put out. So, the defence of 04/05 would be hard to breakdown but Hazard and Costa would ( on their day) give them serious concerns. Would the attack of 04/05 give modern day Chelsea problems? .... Drogba was still raw and quite often not that good....sometimes a front 3 from Gudjohnson, Cole, Duff and Robben ( when not injured) was used in a type of false 9. Again like this current side they could dig in and get a 1-0 ( think they had a lot more ) when required. So all in all....low scoring draw for me

JT Azpi...should have won it last year Hazard

but could be improved. Didier Drogba wasnt 'all that' in his first season

I think that between the 2 teams there is a little difference overall...but having thought about it would take Hazard over Robben, Matic over Thiago and Costa over Drogba for comparing 04/05 to 14/15

not so sure about being on this forum where keyboard warriors from around the world can lay into you. Have my own quite strong opinions on the game of football as a whole especially as a paying supporter who has been to many matches (not all Chelsea).

It would be better to compare squads rather than teams...missing from 04/05 are players like Glen Johnson, Wayne Bridge and Joe Cole amongst others who all had a decent amount of minutes on the pitch. Likewise with this seasons squad, there will be a few players that could be added. I think Drogba and Robben were both a weakness in that 2004 team. Robben had a difficult start with an injury but did produce some electrifying performances but just wasnt quite consistent enough for me, and Drogba although was OK at time took a long time to adapt to the premier league and didnt show proper consistent classy performances until a couple of years later so I agree that the comparison would have been better for a different season. So for me the 04/05 team upfront would be any 3 from Robben, Duff, Cole, Gudjohnson and sometimes Drogba who at times looked very raw and certainly nowhere near the polished article of later years. Who from the 04/05 team would get into todays team and vice versa....well they played different systems for a start so hard call.