The Skipper

If Sturridge had the minutes Giroud had this season... Oh my.

If you bother to read the Sturridge thread with a brain, you'll see Sturridge is getting praised for being a threat - no one is praising him for missing the changes.

Let's forget he out scored both Torres and Drogba combined in the league last season...

Start Danny. Let him regain form and he'll finish his chances.

I don't think that's too true, he was getting a lot of stick because he supposedly took shots instead of letting play develop, not because he was missing chances frequently. Sturridge has a good finish on him, since his youth career the lad's scored tons of goals. He just needs a consistent run in the team - at Bolton he had a couple of great finishes and the same can be said about the first part of last season - you don't score 10+ goals from out wide after half a season without being a good finisher.

Is Marcelo going to be injured forever? Is Coentrao so bad that he can't even be a good back up/alternative to Marcelo? Come on man...

Sturridge's finish isn't at his best because he hasn't been given an extended run. Give him 2/3 more 90 minute games at CF and he'll regain his touch. He actually has a good finish as we can attest to last season.

Grow up man .

It's only a problem if you chose to naively believe it. Why the hell would Madrid buy Cole when they've got Marcelo AND Coentrao?

Wow. Troll-nation.

Not just the back four but the whole team. You say that the Terry - Luiz partnership didn't really face strong opposition but neither were Swansea and Liverpool. Don't know why people seem to shift all the blame for being bad at the back to Luiz.

You're right it's quite ambiguous, but my point is that you can't say the defence is better because Luiz doesn't played.

Notice how our defence was even better when Terry - Luiz were paired at the start of the season.

Excellent post Las7. However, one thing has to be mentioned - next season we've got KDB, McEachran and Chalobah back - they will all get minutes hopefully. Marin hasn't been used yet due to his injury problems, and I feel Moses has been under utilised as well along with Sturridge (who has also been injured himself). We also have Kakuta, Essien and Benayoun returning as squad players potentially (although it is likely they'll be sold, and I would've personally kept Kakuta or Benayoun this season as they might've been helpful) so I think our squad for next season will certainly be lot stronger! Haven't even mentioned the likes of Lukaku and Bruma also coming back... We've got a deep squad I'd say but we've loaned half of them out(and for good reasons)!

Still think we need more than just a pure goal scorer. Mind you, Torres' goal scoring ratio at Liverpool was immense.

No, you did. RDM rates Luiz above Cahill and Ivanovic at CB.

It's quite funny how Azpilicueta should now be a starter after 2 decent games against Swansea and a poor Liverpool side. No. Azpilicueta might be a specialist RB but I'm sure many would pick Ivanovic at RB 99% of the time if we have a fully fit defence. It's quite funny how many forget how solid the JT - Luiz partnership was at the start of the season, and how sketchy a JT - Ivanovic partnership looked not too long ago. I think both Cahill and Luiz are better as a CB when paired with JT than Ivanovic is - because they both compliment JT better. Our strongest back four at this very moment will always be Cole - JT - Luiz/Cahill - Ivanovic. How many times have we played with that back four in the last few weeks? Rarely. It's ridiculous how people neglect this fact and suddenly want a new defence. Not many left backs out there better than Cole, and not many right backs out there better than Ivanovic. Simple.

How can you say RDM is a Civic compared to Pep who's meant to be a Ferrari? This website sucks sometimes. Wow.

Ooooh yeah of course, what could be better than a compliment from the mighty lads of TalkChelsea?

Glad he's back for the December run in. We need him.

You're getting way too ahead of yourself.

In his prime definitely, don't know about the Drogba last season.

Still don't think he'll come in January. He might've said nice things about us, but that does not mean he's leaving Atletico.

Sorry? How can anyone think Azpilicueta is better at RB than Ivanovic and then proceed to say we're short at LB? Good gracious.