Naked Mole Rat

John Terry, hands down. Best defensive display I've seen in a long while.

-------------Drogba-----Sturridge ---- Malouda-Lampard---Meireles---Ramires ---- Cole------Terry---------Ivanovic---Bosingwa ---------------------Cech We should get our wingers to help out the full backs for this match.

We probably should have scored six goals on Krul, but we also could have scored two on Cech, and Newcastle almost scored two or three on Cech as well. We were the better side, and I'm not trying to take anything away from our players, but it really was one of those matches that could have turned out badly for us with just one bad moment.

I don't expect a lot, but the way Alex and Anelka are already being treated like they don't belong to the club suggests to me that we are very close to signing a centre back and possibly a winger. I think the most logical guess as to who those two players will be is Cahill and De Bruyne.

What a match. Could have gone either way, and it must be said Newcastle were very unlucky to lose 0-3. Anyway, I'm very happy with our performance in general, although David Luiz seems to not have learned his lesson yet, and Lampard needs to be a little more alert and concentrated on the ball. I'm a bit disappointed with the way he reacted after being substituted as well. Terry on the other hand was sensational. I would give his performance 10 out of 10 only if he hadn't picked up that stupid booking for dissent. Sturridge played very well, too, but as other people have mentioned he should learn to pick out his teammates when he can.

Not surprised at all about the two leaving and glad to hear, too, but what the hell is up with this isolation business? Could it be for a disciplinary reason, or is it just to prevent the team morale from dropping? Either case, it's difficult to comprehend.

Well, not really. Look at how many people voted against Carlo's sacking: http://forum.talkchelsea.net/topic/8975-official-carlo-sacked/page__hl__%20carlo%20%20sack

Yup, they've been very generous to us, but how did Cech not make it?

More respect for Carlo. It must have been really difficult to show consistent support for his players and respect for the club's decisions even when he knew all this and was getting criticized for being ignorant and blind.

Definitely looks neater, but I haven't decided if I like it yet. Btw, I heard they were going to include the like/dislike bar on the preview thingy (like the ones in the bar on the right-hand side in Super-Frank's screenshot) what happened to that?

I didn't say that Torres was an EPL icon or that his achievements in the PL are greater than Drogba's. But he's definitely up there as one of the biggest stars PL's produced, and for a lot of people, Torres is one of the players they think of when they think of the PL. I mentioned Torres as one of the many big names that represent the PL, but I don't think that any one of them stands out more than the others, which is why I don't understand how the author could so easily dismiss all the others and go with Drogba. That's all. Not trying to say Torres is greater than Drogba or anything like that.

Chelsea's revolution is one of the biggest thing that have happened in the PL so far, but still, I don't see how that alone should make us more iconic than United who have been by far the most successful club in the PL history. Also, Drogba may be one of the few players that stand out, but he certainly isn't THE most outstanding player in the PL so far. He does have a great character, but that's not good enough to put him above Henry, Ronaldo, Torres for Liverpool and Berkamp to pick a few as the PL icon. And the article in general is pretty dull and weak. As I was reading this, I had to keep telling myself that this must be a good article (solely because it was pro-Chelsea) and that in the end this guy will convince me and everyone else that he's right. It's failed to convince me, though, because it has only one good point and the rest of it is just so biased. Like warnie's mentioned, it was probably written by a Chelsea/Drogba fan.

Looks pretty damn proud as she's saying it, too. LOL

Great analysis. I agree with most of these points, especially the one about Drogba and Ramires being our key players when it comes to pressing. Despite the routine criticisms he receives (technique, creativity, etc) I've always thought Ramires, who can probably cover more ground than Mata and Sturridge combined, was one of the most important players we had. About Mata, I'm sure many people have noticed, but he's certainly not the type of winger we were looking for. His crossing isn't bad and he's got a bit of pace, but he doesn't really seem very comfortable in that position, and I think we'd be better off if we played someone else in that position. Right now, it seems like the only way Mata can perform at his best is if he played more like a CAM, making Cole to basically cover all of the left flank. While I appreciate Cole's offensive contributions, I think we should consider that he's in his thirties and won't be able to continue his form for much longer. So, I think we should probably consider playing a 4-3-3 that resembles a 4-2-3-1 with Mata being the most advanced of the three midfielders, followed by Ramires (who should drop a little deeper) and Romeu. I wanted to add one thing and that is, with Meireles in the midfield instead of Lampard, we seemed to retain the possession better. It's true Wolves didn't press hard, but Lampard nowadays gives away possession way often and puts a lot of pressure on our defense.

Can't tell if I'm more happy about our win or Barcelona's loss.

Content with the performance today. We were very threatening at attack, passing the ball well and catching Wolves off guard with counterattacks. But I feel that there still needs to be some better understanding among our forwards. Defensively, we did get a clean sheet and looked more organized, but we weren't that comfortable with Wolves' crossing. Many of the crosses shouldn't even have been launched, and I thought Ivanovic should've done a better job closing down Jarvis, and we were very lucky that Wolves couldn't do much with those crosses.

I was following EskWeston on Youtube like CHOULO19 and RZA and ended up here.

Love him when he plays well, hate him when he plays badly or dives. Same goes for everyone else on the team, though. (Currently loving Sturridge and hating Terry, Cech and Drogba) I don't think I've ever had any lasting love or hate for any of our players, not even for Kalou.

It is his fault we're not doing well. Our defeats against Arsenal and Liverpool were largely due to his tactical failure, and whatever he said to the team prior to the Leverkusen match failed to motivate them. He's shown that he's got the courage to drop the big players, but recently, with pressure piling up, he's made some poor squad selections and substitutions as well. I'm not quite convinced it was a right decision to appoint him, but he should be given at least 2 years of time and enough money to have his dream team. Switching managers won't do us any good at all.

Exactly. I want to point one thing out though, and that is that the two teams looked equally demotivated going into that match. Leverkusen, however, changed their attitude when they conceded, and we didn't when we scored. I really couldn't believe what I was seeing, but our attitude actually got worse after Leverkusen's equalizer, and the game in general reminded me of our loss at Goodison Park at the end of last season, except that that time nothing was at stake, and this time, a loss could mean humiliation of having to play in the Europa League.

Sturridge. Could've been Cech except that he ticked me off by showing no sense of urgency after Leverkusen had equalized. Playing for a draw against a side who are weaker than us both on paper and on the pitch? Unacceptable.

Is that you, Sepp?

Am I the only one who's outraged by yesterday's performance? The whole team looked down, they weren't pressing enough, and we let Leverkusen, who came into that game not even expecting to win, to exploit our defensive flaws. That's how I see it. It was especially infuriating because it wasn't even like Leverkusen were pushing up like Liverpool had because they wanted to play safe. Yet, they won the game and had more possession than we did. Yes, they were lucky, but we once again let the opposition penetrate our defense way too easily with one single pass and couldn't deal with them in set pieces. Also, I don't understand why Drogba started and why he wasn't taken off in the second half. I don't blame him, but he was clearly unfit and wasn't pressing enough, and other than the goal, he played pretty badly. That was the same sort of reaction I had when he played against Liverpool; beside his free kicks he was sub-par. And something's gotta be done about Mata. I don't think he plays very well on the left wing. He should probably play in the centre. If there's one thing I was happy with, it was Sturridge's performance. He was really up for the game, made some good runs and crosses and showed some signs of a mature player.

I thought that was a pretty poor decision from Cech. It never really caused a huge problem before that incident, but he really does put Mikel in unnecessarily difficult situations with passes like that. Usually Mikel is able to turn away from the other player but it was always going to happen.

By the way, I feel kind of sorry for Mikel. That was a pretty big mistake and all, but it was Cech who unnecessarily put him under pressure, and that always happens. It's not just Cech, but with Mikel being a formidable ball-keeper, his teammates tend to rely little too much on him and put him in situations like that. He usually does well to spin away from opposition players, but it was always going to happen.