LDN Blue

Tbh I'm not asking you to, neither do I. It was more on the merits of what he actually did with this team.. Just remember, we didn't have Costa, Fabregas, Matic or even Drogba at this time either. Sturridge had left for Liverpool and we were down to Torres & Ba only. Hell our double pivot in the EL final was Lampard-Luiz, that's a big insight into the shape of our team at that time.

Agreed, but that season was heading in one direction Rafa or no Rafa. As I said before, I think he stabilised a rocking ship - We'll both agree to the fact we're happy he's gone and never coming back

QPR want to rescue Chelsea defender from Middlesbrough loan as Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink contacts former club

Yeah but if it was so easy why don't English clubs win it more consistently? It's one of the reasons I'm against us qualifying for the EL in the first place; long travels coupled with having to play on the Thursday without a Football Association unwilling to help such clubs is a hindrance. Trying to then balance the issues of qualifying for the CL with a top 4 finish was harder than it looked so credit where it's due. Rafa's instructions were to qualify in top 4 and win a trophy or 2.. Which he did. Let's not forget personnel wise. Signed Demba Ba for £7m in Jan and made the decision to move Luiz from CB to CM & Ivanovic from RB to CB; those 2 moves in particular sparked us actually beginning to win games. Like I said, I don't like the bloke and hope he never comes back to Chelsea. His campaign started awfully as well, loss to QPR iirc. But by the end he'd done what he came to do and really didn't damage us in any way.

Lol let's not be hypocrites mate. That season was a disaster Rafa or no Rafa. At that time he was the only one who made that midfield of Oscar, Mata and Hazard actually work - Thank fuck we got rid of that terrible incorporated nickname they made up on here. Let's face it, under Di Matteo we were a sinking ship. Rafa somewhat stabilised it. You can write off the EL win as much as you want, but we all celebrated it like it was any other trophy - In fact it was our second European Cup in as many years! The fact there's an argument on this forum that we should qualify for the EL and win it goes a long way to prove that. You can belittle the way we won too, but let's not forget how close we came to being battered by Bayern in 2012 I didn't like the bloke as much as anyone, but he did do 'well for us' imo..

I mean, you can argue that if Hiddink doesn't win the CL/EL then Rafa did better

Don't toy with my heart with these Stones, Isco & Marquinhos rumours. Guaranteed 2/3 are agents trying to get their clients better deals.

Right I don't feel that sorry for him He was never going to get fan approval at Chelsea, certainly not openly. We can admit amongst ourselves he actually did a job when he got here, finished top 3 with some silverware to show for it, but he even knew how unforgiving SB crowd could be. He did get a respectful goodbye though.

He put up with it so far to be fair & somehow he keeps finding himself in the Brasil team, so he can't have that much to complain about? But overall I do agree, there's no point in keeping him around if we do sign Isco (the outcry for Justice for Musonda would be incredible too). I reserve judgement on Isco though. We all thought Pedro would light up the League and he's taking his time to find his feet. Hopefully Isco won't be the same, but still.

Do have to admit, thought he would've burned out by now & gone back to in 2013-14 form. Glad he's proven me wrong and I hope he continues to keep developing.

Lool, I actually do feel sorry for him - to an extent. His failed media wars with SAF & Mourinho damaged him, rivals saw him as weak and naive. He's a knock-out competition manager, his track record proves that considering he's won both major European Cups, both with English teams as it happens! But he's one of those guys you'll either get along with really well or you won't and that'll be very damaging esp for Rafa. Terry didn't want him at Chelsea (much like the fans) & he's reportedly having problems with James at Real. Towards the end of his Liverpool tenure it was said Gerrard & Torres weren't happy with him either.

Premature. He definitely won't be going anywhere until July at least - No way we sell in January. I also don't believe Zidane will be taking over in long-term capacity by any means, he's only been coaching for 2-years and with the pressure and expectations of Real he'd be smart to reject anything beyond 6 months. Rumour suggest Mourinho will be contacted soon enough too.

To be fair, Gary Cahill has also always been a great last-ditch tackler. The problem with Cahill was that many of those last-ditch tackles he was forced to make came about because of his own mistakes in trying to play the ball out. Zouma is capable of being a ball playing centre back - at his age it's not a fallacy to think it. But if he is going to try then he can't become like Cahill and allow his personal mistakes to result in such situations. So perhaps it's better to leave him to his already established qualities. Height, speed and strength. Signing a ball-playing CB therefore is more important for us - Is that Stones?

His progress is incredible! My friend's Dad is from Milton Keynes so we went to a couple of Dons games and Alli really stood out then but so did a lot of that team, we didn't think much of him at the time for that reason. Then he got signed by Tottenham and were still unsure, knew he'd been doing things for England U21s at that time too so it wasn't out the blue he was scouted. We never quite thought it would be so soon he was breaking down the door of established first team members at Tottenham. Ryan Mason was meant to be their 'guy' and now it's Alli At the time I said "i'm disappointed Chelsea never signed him", but I'm glad. He'd have never got that exposure for us here, the RLC comparison has already been alluded to. If that means we one day end up paying £40-60m for him because of that, so be it. Even if it is Spurs, it's just a refreshing to witness.

Good thing is, he seems patient right now. He's got time on his side, he's not around 23-25 bracket where playing every game is a big priority. He's 19 and I'm sure even training with the first team, with people like Terry and soon Drogba looking over his progress. So he wouldn't actively be seeking a loan away just yet. But I'm sure if he continues to be messed around by 35s substitutions then he won't be quite the happy chappy he is now. Hiddink seems to be good at the whole man-management thing so I'm sure he's verbally communicating with RLC on a weekly basis about how he wants him to train along with Eddie Newton (Who I believe has been placed especially to work with the u21s).

Great game in Valencia! Real down to 10, went 2-1 via Bale and Valencia just equalised. 5mins + stoppage left to play!

But I think that fact alone is quite alarming wouldn't you say? At the peak of Matic's time in 2013-14 he was a rock in the midfield and the fact he was settled there doing an adequate job was vital. You want your defensive midfield settled. We had a time where Makelele made that his own position and then Essien did the same. Since Essien we've been juggling with Mikel, Romeu, Van Ginkle and now Matic. You can see how that's working to our detriment. The best two team in the world Bayern & Barca have these positions filled with settled players and you can see them reaping the rewards.

Fuck this shit. Hope Courtois smashes his record at Chelsea.. Oh Big Pete, why?!

Aaron Cresswell could be a good shout for that sort of role - Riccardo Rodriguez is still sitting in Wolfsburg too. The former signed a new 5-year deal last summer, but we know contracts mean f*ck all in football now. Unfortunately he'd also be a stop-gap and I don't think it's worth ruining his bright-looking future.

Or perhaps it's Oscar dos Santos Emenalo Júnior

This looks fun to play with

#DareToObi

Heard a lot of promising things about dude, people compare him to Martial. Unbelievable that he's compared to a 19-year old

Ehh.. Slight hyperbole here? Yeah it was a fantastic game today and Hiddink deserves credit with the way the team was set up, the inclusion of Mikel seemed justified too. But we've had these moments in the season and what's the real test for Hiddink is being consistent in this approach to games. We had an advantage in the fact Palace were rubbish & missing a lot of key players, we deserve credit for actually exploiting that. Anyway, I hope we continue to play and kill of games like this. But I'm curbing my own enthusiasm here until it's consistent

Scenes if RLC doesn't play