Madmax

I think Rodriquez would cost much, much more than what we're allegedly refusing to pay for Luis. Wolfsburg will not let go of him for cheap, considering their finances and his WC showing. I don't know why we're not looking at Moreno.

Relax, it was deliberate hyperbole. I said in a following comment that his Belgian performances don't matter to me as a Chelsea fan.

Yes! Love this transfer!

He's the one who said he's a complete striker. You cannot then blame others for judging his performances based on this declaration (as much as I agree that his WC performances mean nothing to me as a Chelsea fan). And yes, he does talk, talk, talk ... there's no way an argument can be made against that - he simply talks far too much and far too bluntly for someone who's not done a goddamn thing in a Chelsea shirt yet. Maybe he is free to express his opinion on his contract/club situation, but his frank statements are unlikely to do him any good with Mourinho (or any other level-headed manager, really). People change. "Chelsea keep signing strikers but it's okay, I have a lot of clubs interested in me, so maybe 1+1=2" hardly screams 'humble' and 'down to earth' to me. So apparently us non-Belgians don't know Lukaku, yet you know that half of our team is not similarly dedicated and parties/drinks? Okay ... You're still bang out of order with the slavery remark and with calling other fans disloyal. WTF! How does this analogy make sense? The club (the boss) has never mistreated Lukaku. If you mean signing Eto'o is mistreating him ... well, tough shit; if he cannot deal with mediocre competition like Eto'o, Ba and Torres, maybe he should have stayed in Anderlecht. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Funny thing is, most people here actually want him to be with us. His constant yapping is actually beginning to turn even those people (me included) against him.

It just shows no-one has any legitimate excuses left for explaining Lukaku's embarrassing soundbytes. When you have to resort to 'slavery'(LMAO!) to try and make a point, you basically have no point worth making.

Someone should ask him if he's ashamed to have been outperformed by Origi, we'll see if he still has much to say then.

Mata's situation last season (first not playing, then being sold) enabled opposition teams to focus on Hazard, marking him out of games at times; they knew they didn't have to be overly worried about Oscar and Willian/Schurrle. This is one of the reasons for Hazard's inconsistency.

His first touch of the ball came around the 9th or 10th minute, well after Belgium went behind. He's quite passive in games sometimes but his teammates don't seem awfully eager to find him quickly either. Just a disjointed side, Belgium.

Yeah it was clear what his instructions were. Hopefully now that Gustavo is back and Neymar is out, he'll shoulder more of the attacking responsibility.

Can't pass up on a cut-price Frenchman.

Debuchy to Arsenal for 8m £

Sky Sports also saying Roma in pole position : http://www1.skysports.com/football/news/11095/9372084/transfer-news-roma-leading-the-chase-to-sign-former-england-defender-ashley-cole

All of his CFC goals :

His determination and will to win is truly awesome. Amazing guy.

Think he's been instructed to sacrifice his attacking instincts by Scolari. He wants Neymar and Hulk to run much of the show. Under Menezes Oscar was truly fantastic. He enjoyed much more freedom and consequently gave far better, effective, rounded performances consistently.

Honestly, I appreciate his work rate and his tracking back and what have you, but to my mind, for someone in his position, all of that should be an add-on to creativity, incisive passing, dribbling and finishing instead of being his primary attributes. I'm looking for him to be 'silky' and 'nimble' more than 'tenacious'. I get that nobody gets a pass from the tactical side of the game under Mourinho, but he's not much good to Chelsea as the no.10 when he doesn't hurt teams going forward.

I know, it was a deliberate example to make you (hopefully) understand how stupid your Torres analogy was.

... Or like we did with Drogba.

It's the market. How about waiting till he actually plays for us, though?

Yeah, embarrassing for him.

Not good enough to be number 1 at Chelsea, and if we want a homegrown squad option who can 'do a job', there's always Bertrand. Don't think Bertrand wants that role anymore, though. So there's that.

Ordinarily I'd agree with you but there are mitigating circumstances at work here. Tiago is clearly a stop gap signing and MvG is coming off an injury ravaged season. The squad as a whole is losing experienced heads and Mourinho is under pressure to win something of relevance. It makes sense for him to look to a good player who's also been around the block and knows the manager's ways and demands (not just on the pitch, but dressing room etc) rather than place that responsibility on a promising youngster. MvG (and Chalobah) would be better off on a loan somewhere challenging; it could serve as a preparatory ground for them to have their breakout seasons with us a year or two down the line while Tiago bridges that gap. We have a very good mix of options in the middle now with Matic, Fabregas, Ramires, Mikel and Tiago.

I hope they aren't selling Griezmann.

Not too big of an issue, imo. Fabregas is good enough to cover Matic's handful forward forays over the course of 90 mins.

Yep. I was referring to the Borussia Monchengladbach bid in the original Sky link.