BLionheart

Great post , But i don't think lampard is finished , He will never be back to his best again but he is still a great midfielder who if used wisely can still be the most effective midfielder in the EPL. I don't think the problem is mainly Lampard , i think it lies more in Mikel and Ramires .... they are 2 good midfielders but Mikel just slows down the tempo too much and if you are looking to move the ball forward with quick short passes or a 1-2 , he is not your man .. and ramires takes too much time on the ball and can only add something to midfield with his drive and pace , while his passing is hardly average . Add that to the fact that both of them lacks smart off the ball movement you will notice he gets no help at all from his midfield in terms of keeping possession or creativity !! While upfront you have the anelkalouda who will either stand still till you give'em the ball , move around and make rounds with it and pass it back to you or shoot from 40 yards away , so his wingers aren't a great aid as well . Lampard always had the benefit of having ballack or deco next to him , they are players who are always looking to receive the ball and play quick passes but our current midfielders are what is called shy players ... Lampard was never a super creative midfielder but his passing is actually very good if he gets the needed support in terms of off the ball movement from other players, that is why i think him and torres will be get huge boost by Mata and Modric(if it happens) .

I have always laughed at people who thought Alex or Iva are better than Luiz , They are great defenders but Luiz for me is on another level , the lad simply has got it all , his pace , superb reading of the game and technical ability will always make him a better defender , let away his offensive contribution and ball distribution ..... Also Luiz is the perfect partner for JT , as JT needs a pacy defender who is a good reader of the game a la carvahlo . About the lack of experience claims , yes he needs to get more experience but who doesn't ?? people tend to look to much into it , for instance if Luiz was the man who lost the ball instead of Alex against west brom people would have said : see , Inexperienced . I can only find one weakness in his game and that is in one on one situation , he doesn't have that perfect timing of when to put a foot in which sometimes ends up with a foul or him being beaten .

If Modric joins, Lampard will be back to his former-self and will be hailed again, you'll see. I know a lot will disagree but i have no doubt about it , the guy desperately needs a hand .... he always had a ballack - deco - thiago - godjunsen kind of player next to him , Ramires and Mikel are good players but put them next to iniesta and watch his creativity , he won't be as half effective as he is now .

I don't know what is wrong with TX , How dare he not like an old-aged club like chelsea letting go off Deco and Ballack (because they are old), only to sign 30 years old sub from liverpool !!!! i don't wanna get into this whole saga again,but back then anyone who had some decent football knowledge and loves CFC would ve known that benayoun with his pre-season glory hasn't added anything to chelsea , at least not yet.

Chelsea FC has confirmed the signing of Juan Mata and only personal agreements are still to be met. Now our front three are expected to look like this :(Mata - Torres - Sturridge) while our bench will look like this:(Drogba - Lukaku - Anelka - Kalou - Malouda - Kakuta) !!! that is a little too much as i would rather have a max. of 2 or 3 senior players as subs , and let youngsters like kakuta get their fair chance. We should let go off at least 1 out of (Anelka - Malouda - Kalou) and that will hopefully be Kalou. Also i think Kakuta will get very limited chances with the squad that we have now , we should loan him out for 1 year , Lille or Bolton looks good. De bruyne is expected to join but he is thought to be not ready yet , so going out on loan again makes much sense for me but back at genk doesn't . we should be looking to loan him out but for an EPL team. Hopefully this year we will witness the end of the Anelkalouda era , and we will start a new era of quick movement and passing from our forwards(Mata,Torres,Sturridge) who if the all have one thing in common then it's their lightening pace. P.S. I know i will get a lot of stick for this but i don't think sturridge is ready yet to make the RW position his own , i think he will be drifting in and out the team for a while till he earns himself a starting position in our XI .

I chose El nino but Cech was just as good .

We have to say that the negotiations went exceptionally (surprisingly) well in this deal , it always seemed like our transfers are never smooth and there is always a big saga that ends on the deadline. Juan Mata is a superb addition not only because he is a great winger but for two more important reasons which are hopefully the end of one of the Anelkalouda , and The start of a goal-scoring Nino. But it has to be said Mata won't solve all of our problems we still need Modric .

When was the last time Bebe started a match for Manutd , or Santa cruz (who is better than kalou) started for Man city or even when was the last time they were used as subs in a half decent fixture ?? while Bendtner and N Gog are still too young prospects who are getting their chances , if they keep fucking up i am sure they will fuck off and Btw Arsenal and Liverpool are hardly a big team in Europe nowadays otherwise we should consider Juventes as a big team as well .

Mata has some very good pace , his comparison with malouda is a total nonsense , they have 2 totally different games and btw Messi , Ronaldo , Neymar are not "typical wingers" , Mata is more of a typical winger than any of those.

I think you have him confused with someone else because if there is one thing i am 100% sure of, it is that the above description can't be for Juan Mata .

I am not a big fan of his game but you gotta respect the guy after the passion and desire he showed to play for chelsea . I don't think he is a heskey or a carlon cole but from what i have seen he is not a drogba as well , he is more like an adebayor if you ask me but with better potential. The main reason i was against this move was that i ve always hoped for more direct , pacy football with 2 proper wingers (Mata/De bruyne - Hazard/Neymar) and El nino esque player in front of them , i was looking for an improvement from the drogba era but i can't see how Lukaku would be an improvement from DD , Let's just hope that he lives up to the hype and be just as good as drogba.

Well that is the kind of decision you have to take enough time thinking about ... I will sell kalou not because anelka is a better player but because anelka will fuck off 1 year later as he is 33 , but kalou might stick around for 4 or 5 years , and i can't live with that .

I don't get why people want kalou out !!! He is a player who can NOT dribble , shoot or pass , but FYI his movement is very good may be he always misses sitters and wastes possession but every now and then he will score a goal while we are 3-0 and will keep his very impressive goal/minute ratio. And btw you can't get a better "super-sub" , Super Kalou is a better sub than any of the following (Arshavin - Valencia - Adam Johnson - Balotelli - Nani).... really ??!! Give him the last 20-30 minutes of games that you are 3-0 or 2-0 up and he will be very likely to score a 3rd or 4th goal , don't fall into the trap of giving those minutes to more deserved youngsters , see what happened when Ferguson did that with hernandez instead of using Owen !! Also let's be honest you gotta love the mystery about salamon kalou , Is he best as a CF or SS or WF ?? you'll never know , but the answer is pretty simple he is surprisingly equally impressive in all postions . you have to admit that kalou keeps impressing you , tbh i can't think of any other player who will shoot a ball a yard away from the goal AT THE FUCKIN UPPER POST !!! also i can't think of any other player/person who will run with the ball into the bodies of his opponents!!! , even if he ends up losing the ball at least he showed courage. Malouda , Anelka and kalou are our best players if you disagree then check the stats

Exclusive: Meet Willian the Brazilian - soon to be at a Premier League club near you http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-2027210/Exclusive-Meet-Willian-Brazilian--soon-Premier-League-club-near-you.html Can't see why we shouldn't go for him , i know we are in for mata but this is a great winger who will cost 12-13 Millions max. , Hopefully we are aiming for both.

Hopefully Lukaku , Romeu , Modric and Mata/Hazard will all be presented together during the last days of this month .

Nasri is good enough for arsenal or liverpool but not chelsea and Btw enough with getting a winger to play as a CM , and a SS to play as WF and a CB to play as a RB , etc. . We certainly need a CM but not another converted one and i am sure there is a lot of better options even if modric doesn't come we will just have to dig deeper.

That would have been logical and reasonable if we hadn't won 2 EPL titles and became invincibles within the 1st 2 years , in 2005 we were already considered a big team and we already had the winning mentality. We had a superb start , Unbelievable success story during those 1st 2 years but since then it looks like we are on the decline instead of improving. Your argument would have made sense if in 2005 we weren't already a big team.

Good points . I know we have been very unlucky with injuries , referees , Jose's sacking and so , also someone said that had JT scored that penalty in 2008 this poll wouldn't exist , that might be true . But finding reasons and explanations for not winning titles actually proves that we have underachieved regardless those reasons keeping in mind that the questions is have we underachieved or not regardless those reasons.

Well "smart" ELDO , you didn't get my point . Zolayes was arguing that since the vote results was 22-6 that proves we haven't underachieved and i was just pointing to the fact that this is a chelsea forum so most of the members will vote for chelsea and will find it hard to admit that sometimes we have have had bad games , bad managers and bad seasons. Just like some people found it hard to admit that carlo was an average manager.

Create another voting topic on this forum and ask what's the greatest team in the world right now ? I bet chelsea will win , but are we the greatest team in the world ? No , we are not . I love chelsea but unlike others i can admit that we are miles away from being the greatest football team , hope you get my point.

So that's your reply !!! you have successfully proved me wrong

Well Let's break this down .... 2003-2004 : EPL runners-up (very good considering this was our 1st season in roman's era) 2004-2005: EPL winners (Superb achievement specially because of the way it was delivered) 2005-2006: EPL winners (Superb achievement specially because of the way it was delivered , Although getting out of UCL was a dissapointement) 2006-2007: EPL runners up and UCL semi-finals (Big disappointment after the last two seasons but acceptable for the same reason ) 2007-2008: EPL runners up and UCL runners up (Huge disappointment as it's another year without an EPL or UCL title) 2008-2009: EPL runners up and UCL semi-finals (another huge disappointment specially because of the bad display during scolari's time) 2009 - 2010: EPL winners and UCL quarter-finals ( Not a bad season as we won our 1st double but not a good one considering how we were humiliated for the 1st time in 7 years in the UCL , and considering that we had no challengers in the EPL. 2010-2011 : EPL runners up and UCL quarter-finals(The biggest disappointment of all , another humiliation in the UCL and how did Man utd capture another league title with the squad they had is beyond me) So to summarize we had 3 good/great season and we had 5 seasons of disappointment , if we had 2 or 3 seasons at the start of the roman era without winning titles i would have understand but since we had a great start winning 2 EPL titles in a classy way and since we had already established ourselves as a big team the following six years was a big disappointment.

Love the positivity and optimism in some people We have had an absolutely superb start to the roman era , but if you would like to face the truth ask this question : Have we underachieved in the last 5 or 6 years ?? Winning only one EPL and once runners-up for UCL is an underachievement for a club that had the talent and squad we had between 2005-2009 Cech , Terry , Essien , Lamps, and Drogba at their peak are one of the best team backbones in history , Keeping in mind that there were no invincible teams a la barca now, and that the EPl was not as tough as now , we have absolutely underachieved. Well if you really believe we didn't underachieve , Then why did we get rid of Grant , Scolari , Carlo ?? wasn't that because they have underachieved??

Already a great player , he will be a big star in the near future i am sure .