Rhino's Skin

What constant thuggery is that then?All he is, is a centre forward who looks after himself....getting involved in tangles, trying to grapple your way out of defenders arm, body, head locks , sledging - giving and receiving, etc etc etc. Its all part of it...football is a contact sport incase you didnt realise that. Would rather have someone like that up top keeping defence occupied rather than someone who used to hide in corners like Torres or throw themselves onto the ground feigning serious injury every time a defender breathes like Drogba used to. Look at old footage of proper centre forwards like Peter Osgood, Malcom Macdonald, etc etc. they used to get battered but dished out as well

Benteke puts himself about a bit as well ...all arms and elbows near defenders. Nowhere near the standard of Costa with guile, runs and finishing. Mind you, remember when Drogba first came....he was all over the place and pretty awful to watch for a couple of years and both of these play at a better allround standard than he did back then

He should only be given a coaching role only if he is good enough. The club is too professional just to hand out important roles just because of who they are....well lets hope they are. So, once he has done his badges and learnt from the current staff...then perhaps ( and only if he shows promise) he should get a role. But perhaps he prefers some type of advisory role rather than coaching..i.e. talking to players breaking into the 1st team squad, speaking to youth about how it was for him etc etc

They are targeting him....firstly and foremost because he is a bloody good player who has defined our season. Loose cannon my backside....he knows exactly what he is doing and he is also playing the game of winding defenders up....two way street here. A season where he has badly been fouled and not picking up any reds....pretty damn good

They are targeting him....firstly and foremost because he is a bloody good player who has defined our season. Loose cannon my backside....he knows exactly what he is doing and he is also playing the game of winding defenders up....two way street here. A season where he has been badly fouled and not picking up any reds....pretty damn good

Would rather have someone who shows a bit off bottle and fight rather than throwing themselves to the ground and pretending to be hurt like one or two of recent legends. Teams at the moment systematically target him by taking turns...WBA did it perfectly. I love his reactions and lets defenders know that they are in a battle. Jose and others ( even media such as talksport ) have started to speak out about this systematic fouling of him and hopefully refs will be wise to it and start to protect him. Reminds me of how George Best was targeted and how he could look after himself

Cannot see whats wrong with a tiny bit of red on the kit. I was always told is was to pay respect/homage to the Chelsea Pensioners...not sure how true that is but sounds plausible enough. Suppose we will see kits in June once Samsung deal is over

Why is it a much better contest?The last game in preseason is the one where you expect to players nearly match fit and an indication of where the team is at. The Charity Shield is just one if those games in the run up to the season start....nothing that special about it.

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.

I want one of these...deffo toys for boys

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.