Ossie the King

Nailed Jose being undermined. Apparently it did have ramifications.

Thanks Abramovich for giving Arsenal the title

Should have just let him rot in the reserves, even for a season.....

Ok hes done it for his family, fair enough. However, youu have to question why the powers that be are letting him go, he has signed a 4-yr deal, so why couldn't he see out the last year with us, then sign a 3yr deal next summer?
If reports are true, that he will receive the last year of his contracts wage (£4m), then we end up being out of pocket once we have signed his replacement. We have £6m of the £10m to buy a keeper and pay his wage. Seeing as Stoke are being reported as turning down a £6m bid from us, for Begovic, I'd say we are the mugs.
On top of all that, where does it leave Mourinho? Said publicly that he didn't want him to be sold, he was obviously trying to take care of his squad.
So we end up swapping Cech for Begovic, and paying out on top. There's absolutely zero FFP in that.

selling the best goalkeeper to your direct opponents what else do you expect. The way the club is doing business is just -.-

I don't see any chance that Pep will end up here.
From options that he has now, Man City,Man Utd and Chelsea
Why will he'll choose us?

We let him go and got Costa who was arguably the best striker in the league last season and got us to a title. Would've been great to have kept both but Lukaku has explained why that didn't happen.

We let him go and got Costa who was arguably the best striker in the league last season and got us to a title. Would've been great to have kept both but Lukaku has explained why that didn't happen.

Pep has never managed anywhere that didn't already have a philosophy of how it wanted it's teams to play so I'm not entirely sure what people are expecting were he to come in. Barca played similarly before he came and very similarly after he left. We need someone to come in to start the whole process and get it going at youth level. Interestingly, the youth teams have played like Mourinho teams for about as long as I've watched them.
I understand the 'loyalty' argument with Cech, but the club (specifically Roman) undermined Jose's authority and made his job harder. I think the club's first loyalty should be to it's coach, not it's back-up keeper. You might say that Cech isn't just any keeper, he's a legend and he earned it. Well my response would be that Jose is a legend too, and he's definitely earned it.

There's no 'cultists', just Chelsea supporters. It's a little odd to use that as an insult when you're one of those people who feels the need to have an Emenalo avatar to fit in with others. That's not a criticism because you may well not be mindlessly following the crowd in doing that and sincerely want to celebrate the man for what he's done.
You'll also notice that it's not just Emenalo, but the entire board AND Mourinho who are receiving criticism. It would probably be those you might label 'cultists' who are looking at the situation in a more holistic manner than those who would call Mourinho 'the architect to this nightmare...'.
It's widely agreed that when you win the league, you need to improve the squad isn't it? You'll hear the 'two or three world class additions' point thrown around, to stop the club from stalling. That's just to retain the title, without looking at going further in Europe.
The club didn't do that. They didn't match the ambition of the coach and it's quite clear they didn't back him in a number of ways. The Cech situation is the obvious one where they went against his express wishes and sold him to a rival. You can't look at that situation and say they backed him, because they quite clearly didn't.
It's quite absurd for a club to not only not strengthen the squad in a summer transfer window, but to actually STRENGTHEN a direct rival in a position they've been struggling in for almost a decade. They undermined his position within the club and they made his job harder.
As for the thing where you take the focus off the summer transfer window by looking at average spend over five windows, I honestly don't think that will work with many Chelsea supporters. They know that the squad wasn't strengthened and that there were no REAL additions to the squad, only like-for-like changes.
Now none of that means we should've been in the position we were, but they are quite clearly factors and not 'crap' and they will be factors for the next coach, and the next coach, and the next coach unless something ABOVE the coaching position changes. That's not the opinion of a Mourinho cultist, but a fellow Chelsea supporter just like every other poster in this forum is.

Pep has never managed anywhere that didn't already have a philosophy of how it wanted it's teams to play so I'm not entirely sure what people are expecting were he to come in. Barca played similarly before he came and very similarly after he left. We need someone to come in to start the whole process and get it going at youth level. Interestingly, the youth teams have played like Mourinho teams for about as long as I've watched them.
I understand the 'loyalty' argument with Cech, but the club (specifically Roman) undermined Jose's authority and made his job harder. I think the club's first loyalty should be to it's coach, not it's back-up keeper. You might say that Cech isn't just any keeper, he's a legend and he earned it. Well my response would be that Jose is a legend too, and he's definitely earned it.

Fair enough point.

Pep has never managed anywhere that didn't already have a philosophy of how it wanted it's teams to play so I'm not entirely sure what people are expecting were he to come in. Barca played similarly before he came and very similarly after he left. We need someone to come in to start the whole process and get it going at youth level. Interestingly, the youth teams have played like Mourinho teams for about as long as I've watched them.
I understand the 'loyalty' argument with Cech, but the club (specifically Roman) undermined Jose's authority and made his job harder. I think the club's first loyalty should be to it's coach, not it's back-up keeper. You might say that Cech isn't just any keeper, he's a legend and he earned it. Well my response would be that Jose is a legend too, and he's definitely earned it.

Pep has never managed anywhere that didn't already have a philosophy of how it wanted it's teams to play so I'm not entirely sure what people are expecting were he to come in. Barca played similarly before he came and very similarly after he left. We need someone to come in to start the whole process and get it going at youth level. Interestingly, the youth teams have played like Mourinho teams for about as long as I've watched them.
I understand the 'loyalty' argument with Cech, but the club (specifically Roman) undermined Jose's authority and made his job harder. I think the club's first loyalty should be to it's coach, not it's back-up keeper. You might say that Cech isn't just any keeper, he's a legend and he earned it. Well my response would be that Jose is a legend too, and he's definitely earned it.

Pick one? Matches others? I think you've lost me.
I do think you're right, that is the current philosophy of the club, Real Madrid lite. Chop and change managers, buy players with no idea of how they fit in to a system, which doesn't matter anyway because the players last longer than the manager so if they fit for this one, they may or may not fit for the next.

I agree with you that the board did FA in the summer when they actually needed to do quite a bit. We could all see how thin the squad was and how bad we were compared to Europe. I was actually okay with PSG knocking us out last year because I thought it would be a sign to the club that things weren't as rosy as the league table suggested.
I think we will be in this state of chopping and changing managers and fitting square players in to round holes until we get some direction as a club, an identity. Then, managers are appointed, and players bought to fit the club's philosophy. Instead of asking a manager to come in a create an identity within a season or couple of years at most. This is also why I'm not that keen on Pep, sure he's good, c'mon, but I don't think he'll have the impact that everyone is expecting.
I have to disagree with you about the Cech situation though. He's a legend of the club and I'm happy for him. He didn't want to up-root his family and the club showed some loyalty towards him. I'm on Roman's side on this one.

Loftus-Cheek isn't ready for the first team...otherwise he would have broken through this season (where Matic, Fabregas, Ramires have all been awful at some point)
He might need a loan spell to 'mature' as a player, like Moyes did with Ross Barkley

Completely cynical of me.....;-)But then again, look at recent fans favourites who are icons at the club. Jose, JT, Frank and DD......when one has to go because of difficult circumstances, then who better to bring in no matter what capacity to keep fans onside.

Thought he showed flashes of getting back to his best, perhaps because he had some help in midfield from Mikel. He seemed to grow as Ramires was introduced too, looking far more comfortable on the ball than he has done in a while. Still some ways to go but we need him to regain his form.

I love that I'm apparently a Mourinho cultist. Makes me wonder what I was doing before he arrived at the club. Would it be fair if I called you an Emenalo cultist. Does your support predate his time here I wonder?
Actually don't answer that. It's not worth talking to someone who is disrespectful to fellow Chelsea supporters.
How very cynical of you. But I think it's a distraction. Why now? Why not 6 months ago?

I love that I'm apparently a Mourinho cultist. Makes me wonder what I was doing before he arrived at the club. Would it be fair if I called you an Emenalo cultist. Does your support predate his time here I wonder?
Actually don't answer that. It's not worth talking to someone who is disrespectful to fellow Chelsea supporters.
How very cynical of you. But I think it's a distraction. Why now? Why not 6 months ago?

I know it's the culture around here to over rate anyone under the age of 21 (or overs apparently getting cruelly denied a Chelsea career like Bamford) but this is just too far.

Pretty tricky with no striker, and even if Costa hadnt been yellowed against Watford I am not sure they compliment each other now. Hazard with Chicarito, now that would be better...

Hazard is without doubt the most talented player in the team but badly needs a mentality that matches his talent both for Club and Country (See world cup). He needs to be more direct too.
Robben and Cristiano Ronaldo were less direct earlier in their careers but the moment they added that to their game, they became even more dangerous than ever before.
Sometimes, especially this season, Hazard is often scared of entering the box, or shooting at goal.
No goals and 2 or 3 assists all season with one/two penalties already taken is not good enough for the EPL POTY last season. It is not even good for his personal development.
I really don't know how hard he trains presently, but I really do hope he starts performing well and scoring again. The team really needs him (as well as Fabregas, Diego and Matic of last season) just like Barcelona needed Messi two seasons ago.