Styles

OK first half, good cross that should have led to a penalty and a brilliant long pass that Neymar wasted. He was absolutely rubbish for the rest of the game though and should have been taken off much sooner than he was.

I was gutted for him when he missed but at least they're through. Hate to see our guys fail on the big stage like that, it was such a bad penalty. Stay away from them in the future though!

Just the 55 goals in the last 3 years...

Aubameyang is averaging 18 goals a season over the last 3 years. Last season Hazard our top goalscorer with 17 goals, the nearest to him was Eto'o on 12. That's absolutely pitiful for a club with our aspirations. The team that won the league had Aguero (28 goals), Dzeko (26), Yaya (24) and Negredo (23). They scored a massive 56 goals more than us over the course of the season. Costa on his own won't be enough, we need more players capable of scoring goals. I'm not sure why Dortmund are selling but they were apparently interested in signing Lukaku so maybe we've struck some sort of deal? I know that kind of thing rarely happens but you never know. Wouldn't surprise me if Lukaku is off to Dortmund this summer.

The comparison is made because the grass is always greener on the other side. If Hazard wasn't our player we'd have a 40000 page transfer thread begging for his signing.

Robben in the last 2 years is a truly great player. Bale is nowhere near that level, not even close.

Also Bale plays with Benzema and C.Ronaldo who more than carry their own weight, take the pressure off him to some extent. Even Bale's assists numbers jumped to 16 last year just off the strength of playing with better attacking players, he'd never reached anywhere near that before in his career. Just think what kind of numbers Hazard would be getting playing with better attacking teammates? As much as we rate our own guys, compared to Benzema and C.Ronaldo, Hazard is working with significantly lesser players. He'd be a beast for Real Madrid, even more so than Bale in my opinion.

Scoring doesn't elevate his general performance. See that's the problem. Hazard can have a very good game without scoring and people will say he doesn't score enough, needs to shoot more etc. Bale has a terrible game but scores a goal and it's excused. What happens when the goals dry up?

I watched the final too and didn't think Bale did anything particularly special. Di Maria was the best attacking player on the pitch by miles. I really don't want to sound like a hater but I just think he's a limited player.

I really must be missing something about Bale because I just don't rate him that highly. He's an exceptional athlete with a good shot, but I consider him a supremely average footballer.

They really need to step up next season and share the load offensively. Oscar too. We know what we're going to get from Hazard, it's the other guys that need to turn up next season.

Well said. If he could give us around 20 goals a season and create a good amount for his teammates - and he's capable of doing both - I would be more than happy. I don't expect him to ever explode and get Messi/C. Ronaldo numbers.

My bad if I'm coming across as condescending, I can be a bit of a mug at times. I get that we want him to be more decisive, and I'm not saying he can't improve beyond the level he's at now, but I find some of the criticism coming his way a little over the top considering the context of the two games we've just seen. *please don't ban me *

No one talks as much as Lukaku, he needs his own chat show. To be fair to Lukaku he's still a young player so hopefully he'll learn to keep it brief with the press. But the Belgium manager is a grown man leaking things he's been told in private, presumably by Courtois. Cech having to read this stuff is

What a prick this Belgium manager is, talks way too much.

You call it 'passing up responsibility', I call it 'Hazard making what he considers to be the right choice in the heat of the moment'. They're very different things. OK, I didn't see that chance but I'll take your word for it. So we're all in agreement that he makes the right decision most of the time? The guy isn't a robot, he's going to fuck up every now and again...like every other player in the world.

Hazard's intelligence is what allows him to make the right decision. Of course there are instances when he'd have been better off taking a shot himself - still nowhere near as much as most would have you believe - but he gets it right most of the time. I would much rather Hazard play his natural game and live with the results instead of asking him to start taking shots against his own better judgement because other players are doing it. Hazard has barely got an open look on goal in the World Cup so far, so why should he start smashing shots that have very little chance of resulting in a goal? Because Ronaldo does?

OK. Now let me ask you this: do you consider Hazard to be an intelligent player?

So it's not really about Hazard doing the right thing, it's about him becoming a superstar and getting press coverage? Interesting.

Are you guys talking about the chance right at the end of the game when he passed the ball to AN OPEN teammate in a better position? Hazard had two players directly in front of him and any shot would almost certainly have been blocked. He had an open man available who had a significantly better chance of scoring and he made the right decision. I will never understand this clamour for Hazard to start taking low-percentage shots. How on earth is that going to make him a better player? Please explain in simple language because I'm clearly missing something.

Yet another assist that has won a game for Belgium. He has played in two very tactical matches against a good Algerian team and a Russia side managed by Capello. He recieved a lot of attention in both games and barely got any space for 75-80 minutes but still MADE THE DIFFERENCE which is the mark of a truly brilliant player. But if you listen to most people they'll tell you he's been a failure who needs to 'shoot more init', gotta love it

He is also insanely fast. There was one moment against Algeria he blew away a defender who had a good few yards head start. Lukaku's fast for a big man but he's not particularly quick in general terms. Over the course of the last season I've come to the conclusion Lukaku just isn't good enough to be a leading striker here and at best would be a squad player.

It's crazy just how much better Origi looks.

He played really well last night. It'll be interesting to see how he does against Argentina.

He is delusional, he hasn't stopped trying to make excuses for himself. Another pathetic comment from a pathetic excuse of a player.