The Skipper

Dead wood doesn't sell for £30m+.

No, I don't consider just a 1 on 1 as a quality chance - it's feeding players into dangerous positions which allows them a good probable shot on goal that I consider as a quality chance. I'm not defending our strikers and I'm not saying that we don't need a striker - we 100% need a quality striker. I've never said anything less. What I am saying though is that getting in this quality striker will not complete us as a team. As I've said many times before, if we had let's say a Diego Costa upfront for the 13/14 season we probably would've won the league because quality strikers take half chances and produce magic on their own, but it would've papered over the cracks because simply signing a striker alone would not automatically improve our final play in the third to the level we should be aspiring at; to the level which will allow our most talented players to truly flourish. We lose out badly in the ratio of taking chances because our chances created aren't anywhere near as good as Liverpool's or City's who consistently slice open these defences we struggle against. The ratio is bad because they aren't quality chances that are made via good build up play - we rely way too much on the individual brilliance of players. We need to greatly improve how we play against teams that sit deep; against the likes of Norwich, Crystal Palace etc. who are obviously just playing for a point - not saying they're easy to beat or anything but with the attacking talent we have on the team and the talent we will be acquiring over the summer we should be able to consistently break down these sort of teams just like City and Liverpool do. Sure, I'm not suggesting that all of our chances have to be clear cut - of course not - but the ratio of clear cut chances that we have compared to the ratio that Liverpool and City have is obviously not a good thing for us. We don't score enough from these positions because we don't have a true system that fully allows our most talented players to thrive - how many times is Hazard surrounded by 3 players in the final third when we face deep defences? How is he meant to impact the game when that happens? This is why the system in the final third must improve - we have to create more spaces for our most creative and talented players to thrive in - a simple overlap from an attacking fullback who has a good cross on him and is threatening in the final third will create more space for Hazard - likewise how linking up with a CM in the pivot (City have Fernandinho or Yaya, Liverpool have Gerrard) or an AM who is dangerous in the attacking third (think Coutinho, Aguero when he's dropping off a Dzeko or Negredo or Silva) and connects play well will also create more space for someone like Hazard to try and influence the game with his talent. The system we implement right now doesn't allow that - and admittedly Mourinho has seen that we don't have the personnel to implement a system like that which is why he himself said that we've gone to a more conservative style of play. Hazard scored plenty of great long range shots in the 12/13 season, Oscar scored an absolute peach against Juve, Schurrle used to routinely bang them in from long range for Leverkussen... We do have players that can provide something special outside the box but because we aren't cohesive enough in the final third they struggle to create that sort of space for themselves. Even if we do score an early goal (which you can't always rely on - what if we don't?) I personally don't think it's wise to then return to our counter attacking game against the likes of Norwich, Crystal Palace, Villa, WBA etc... Sure we can be slightly more conservative but we do need that 2nd goal to kill them off because anything can happen in football - it's much better to be proactive than reactive against these sort of teams that sit deep, grab that 2nd goal to kill them off (Mourinho always says we struggle in killing teams off) and then perhaps going to a counter attacking game (when they have nothing to lose and when the game is not still in the balance) is justified. If you're going to quantify Nasri and Sterling as finishers surely I can quantify Oscar and Hazard as finishers as well? Like I said, in the 12/13 season both of these scored better goals than any Sterling or Nasri have. They certainly have that in their locker. I agree that we don't have enough quality in the CF position, I'm not debating that whatsoever, but like I said before, we need more quality in our general play in order for our players to flourish more. Signing a top striker is definitely a move into the right direction but we need more than that to truly become a complete team that doesn't struggle as much against sides that sit deep.

Can one of the Brazilians members confirm the Oscar quotes please?

To be fair, lionsden has from day one not rated Oscar in the number 10 role, regardless of Mata.

The Luiz shot was brilliant but not something I would count as a chance that you'd expect him to score. Sure, it was a chance but it was pretty speculative in my opinion. Hazard's obviously counts as a chance but again, it would've been a brilliant individual goal had he scored, not a chance created through good build up play. You can't keep relying on brilliant individual goals to win you games as they're rare. Again, I'm not saying it wasn't a chance but it wasn't a clear, clear chance that you'd expect Eden to 100% score. On Torres, the less said the better lol. But yeah, respectfully agree to disagree. It's nice to have a debate with someone who doesn't constantly act childish or tries to insult you when you don't agree on things. Cheers pal

That's fair. Cech is obviously still a WC goalkeeper and Schwarzer is an excellent deputy - I wouldn't mind either way tbh, as long as Courtois signs a new contract I'm fine with Cech being our undisputed number 1 for another year.

I guess here is where we disagree on what a "quality" chance is. Sure, those are chances, but apart from Schurrle's chance which was well worked with Matic's superb ball, none of those are clear cut chances that you'd definitely expect us to score. Luiz's (speculative shot) and Hazard's shots were more down to individual brilliance. It wasn't due to us cutting them open via a good, calculated build up.

£32m. €35m translates into £28.5m so if that is true the latter would be the fee we pay for Diego Costa. £28.5m is a very good price but I think I'd rather keep that extra £4m and bring back Courtois.

I'm talking about chances created. Sure, we've created chances but in my opinion they haven't been chances of real quality, i.e. clear cut, and that's my argument, and that ties in with chances converted. You can't expect to convert more when the quality of the chance is poor. Actually, on average we've made the most shots in the league this year yet we're still 30 odd goals behind Liverpool and Man City - surely that should tell you that our shot selection just isn't good enough (because of various reasons I've stated before)? But you're right, you have your right to believe that we do create enough quality chances whilst I have the right to believe that we don't - as you said, it's better to agree to disagree on the subject, since we are going round in circles with the discussion.

Agreed. Torres and Ba's link up play is horrific 99% of the time. A quality striker like Diego will definitely help our play in the final third; disagree on the fox in the box comment on Eto'o. Eto'o improves our attacking play a lot as well, an on form Eto'o for us this year was very good, he linked up excellently with Hazard. That Hazard goal against Sunderland I think perfectly illustrates how well Eto'o can link up with players in the final third.

Could you please list me the amount of quality chances we created in the Norwich game? I can only think of the Schurrle chance where he hit the post, and that's just one. Not good enough. We didn't even create one clear cut chance for our striker in that game. I don't think we even created the best chance in that game. Of course we aren't going to win every game, but to say it's naive to expect us to beat the likes of Norwich, WBA, Sunderland, Crystal Palace etc. is surely overstating it a bit?

We do have midfield players that are decent shooters from outside the area - Schurrle especially, and let's not forget Hazard and Oscar have it in their locker as well. I don't think that's the debate here at all. Now to those charts; you can't honestly tell me that a shot inside the box equates to a quality chance. The chart ignores the speculative nature of the shot, how many defenders are still in the box, whether the player shooting the ball is being heavily marked or not... It's not like those shots in the box equate to 1 on 1 quality chances for whatever player is taking that shot. Shot on target in the area does not equal a quality chance, surely you know that? The same article above tells you this regarding the Norwich game: "We had 4 shots on target in this game. 1 of which was inside the area. 1 shot on target inside the area is not good enough. It is that simple." Are you telling me that we created enough to win that game? Surely not. It's not about sexy football, it's about creating quality chances. We should be able to consistently do that with the talent in the team. Can you honestly tell me that our strikers (no matter how bad they've been this season) have routinely flopped 1 on 1, quality chances that have been laid on a plate for them this season? Surely not. Of course goals change the psychology of a game, we're not discussing that here - what we are discussing is that we don't create enough quality chances to get these goals. If we truly want to be a dominant side, we must improve our play in the final third by creating more space for our creative players and our strikers, getting them into dangerous positions and bettering our off the ball movement and link up play. If you honestly think we've created as much as the likes of City and Liverpool did this season then respectfully, we'll just have to agree to disagree.

Mate, I'm not disagreeing that a better striker would've probably nicked us a few points here and there but can you can't honestly tell me that we consistently created quality chances like City and Liverpool do. We just didn't. The teams that have scored the most goals this season have set their team up with two strikers, of course most of their goals are going to be via them - us on the other hand, only field one striker, so of course our goals are going to be more distributed. You can't really use that to justify what you're saying simply because they play a completely different system to us. Not all of our chances are going to fall to our striker either because we play a 1 man system up front so it's natural that some go to our attacking midfielders. As I said before, you really can't compare our system to City's or Liverpool's simply because we don't have a top striker and we do not play like they do.

So you think we deserved to win the Norwich game? Come on. In the Norwich game we had one (one!!) shot on target in their area. The Sunderland and Villa games I can perhaps understand because or refereeing decisions but I still think we don't create enough quality chances and that has to do with the lack of personnel we've got anyway (no top striker, no real creativity from midfield, no real support from our fullbacks and movement in the final third to help stretch the play and create spaces for our play). You won't convince me that we've created enough quality chances - one or two each of these games does not warrant in enough for me simply because you can't rely on your players scoring every single quality chance that comes your way; that is impossible. Even the best players miss quality chances here and there.

I don't think they're comparable because we had a lot fewer chances in the other games. I don't think you can say we've created as many quality chances as we did in the West Ham game against other teams - the Norwich, Sunderland, Crystal Palace, Aston Villa and West Brom (away) games; games where we dropped points - come to mind. Sure, maybe we created 1 or 2 decent chances against these teams but you need more than 1 or 2 decent chances to dispatch teams away. The West Ham game - maybe even the Everton game where I thought we created enough quality chances but just failed to dispatch them - are the only games where we've dropped points where I can fully say that we should've gone on and won it but we failed to do so because of lack of good finishing. The other games however I don't think I can fully say the same. Costa's clinical goal scoring record will definitely help us dispatch more of these teams away but we still need to create more quality chances. We can't expect Costa to score 1 in every 2 shots. Can't expect that from anyone.

Moreno, Negredo and Carvajal won't get dropped IMO. Moreno and Carvajal are both 2nd choice full backs to Alba and Azpi, and Negredo will back Costa.

£32m is fair. Gives us plenty of ammunition to fully reshape the squad.

DM are the worst paper out there.

Yeah, the West Ham game definitely was down to the lack of clinical finishing, we created lots of quality chances in that game. Someone like Costa (or even someone like Lukaku) definitely would've bagged the points for us in that game.

Where are people getting his wages from? Please don't tell me it's from the DM (who put up article an hour or so before the new deal got announced stating that he's basically off).

Diego Costa is just a freak, he has scored 29% of his chances this year (in the league) which is just very, very clinical, I don't think any striker or player around Europe comes anywhere close to him when it comes to taking chances (statistically wise).

Yes, because those saying that we need more than a striker to complete the team are saying that we don't need a striker? How stupid does that sound? I've said before, a top striker would've probably won us the league this year but it wouldn't have made our side complete. Even Mourinho acknowledges that and understands that we're still a couple of top signings away from completing the side. He hasn't said, "all we need is a striker".

There's a difference between a shot on target and a good quality chance. You don't need stats to tell you that. As the author of that title said, the article is purely based on stats and everyone knows stats don't tell the whole story. If we go by stats we've apparently created the 2nd most chances in the league after City. Everyone knows that most of those chances weren't quality chances.

Ha. Next joke.