Styles

Ancelotti is stealing a living. He has lost the players, he cannot inspire them and I doubt he does anything during training to try and improve their quality of play.

Why even have a manager in that case? Surely the players can manage themselves, we could save Ancelotti 6m a year salary.

A truly poor manager. I hate to say it but he is a fraud.

I can't remember the last time I wanted a manager out as badly as this. I was even willing to give Scolari a little bit more time than Ancelotti. Even though there are clear problems in the squad he isn't making the most of what he has. He has to go now, enough is enough.

Everton have had 64% possession so far in the second half.

That is more or less Carlo's tactics. Score a goal and hit teams on the counter ala Sunderland. The curious thing is how the hell do we score that all important first goal when we create rubbish chances, have no width, can't keep the ball in the oppoisition half. Get Lampard out of this game please. Jesus.

Depressing football. Honestly, I'm genuinely sad watching this crap.

He really has. He looks so laboured when running with the ball, as if he's running in quick sand. He has also lumped so many balls at the forwards, not once has he slid them in or combinated well with them. Awful display in line with his recent performances.

This is embarrassing football, getting dominated at home by an average Everton side struggling in the league.

Just LOL at the idea of Essien in a more offensive position. He can barely make progressive passes under no pressure, he would be completely out of his depth having mainly offensive duties. Essien's best qualities are fast becoming redundant to the style of play Ancelotti wants, that much is clear. You seem unwilling to accept that Mikel is a better DM because of his distribution. He is technically superior to Essien; first touch, technique, vision and passing ability both long and short.

I doubt it too but he has to change something soon because the team is looking devoid of any ideas.

Clevemayer good post and thanks for the videos. I really enjoyed the Mikel one, his ability to shield the ball under pressure and keep possession is excellent. You're right in that it's not just the midfield but also the attack, they have to come deep, create movement, stretch play, interact with their midfield because they are not seperate functions they have to play as a unit. Here's a great piece on how our midfield is working, it is basically what we're talking about in this topic. http://www.thehardta...-uncut-diamond/

Ahhh but Arsenal actually play them.

Why is everybody saying Torres looks bad and lacks confidence? Who is supplying him? Where ae the crosses from wide areas? The only decent pass he got all night was a long ball fom Luiz which is vey hard on the run. He was making some great runs against Fulham but nobody in the team has the ability to make the final ball for him. Infact his movement is too good for our team, he makes runs but they just can't make the pass. It was like that with Cespo as well, his movement was magnificent but he was it was just too clever for our players.

Who said that? Mikel just does something the others can't; retain possession under pressure. Mikel worked well with Deco the most because they could play between them and keep possession. If you watched the 7-1 win over Aston Villa last season you would have seen the superb interplay between Mikel an Deco creating all sorts of angles and passes and involving other players. Mikel doesn't get that sort of interaction with any of the other midfielders because they cannot do the basics.

So what happened when Germany met Spain?

You must be having a laugh? Are you serious? Xavi doesn't create chances for strikers? :huh: That is the most absurd thing I have ever heard. Your ignorance is really showing here. Spain scored 8 goals because teams played a 10-0 formation against them most of the time. Yet they still won, the controlled the game and were decisive when it mattered. Games are tight because the opposition make it tight but they still find a way through. Germany scored 14 because nobody respected them, teams opened up against them and left themselves open to the counter i.e. Germany vs Argentina.What do you think the result would be if teams opened up agains Spain the same way they did against Germany? You would see scorelines of 5-0 or 6-0.

No that a simple mistake to make if you look purely at goals and assists. Look at the games, look who is controlling and dictating play. Look who is dominating midfield and making pinpoint passes to almost everybody on the field. We don't have a midfielder fit enough to lace Xavi's boots in terms of vision and passing. Here are some videos for you to watch and see what I mean; , , Messi a great footballer but Xavi is just as important to Barcelona's success as Messi.

Fantastic post. I agree with pretty much everything you have said there. Under Mourinho we were an athletic counter-attacking team that would play at break-neck speed. You do not need ball-playing technical midfielders with this approach, you simply require athletic box-to-box midfielders. With wingers that stretched play they excelled with the extra room. I highlighted the bit in bold because that is specifically relevant to the point I was making. Ancelotti's mandate seems to be to provide a free-flowing, easy on the eye football. If that is the case then many of our players are unsuited to this style of play. The area that seems to be suffering with this the most is the midfield. Other than Mikel I don't think any of our senior midfielders are cool under pressure, able to receive the ball while marked, pass the ball accurately and move into space to receive a pass. Of the young players McEachran is by far the best because he plays football with his head up and passes the ball one or two touch. More importantly he is able to dribble with the ball in central areas and opens up options for himself and teammates. Honestly I was salivating at the mouth when I saw the video of McEachran against Newcaslte in September. He was doing things Essien and Lampard for example would never in their wildest dreams attempt to do. Some of the dribbles between Newcastle players was incredible. The most important thing that the club can do is bring in a similar player for him to play with. He doesn't need runners beside him he needs another technical football to play and pass with. This is the video I'm talking about - Honestly I can't wait to see what he will be like in 2-3 years time. I just hope he gets enough games to nurture him properly.

We have to move away from our reliance on one player to score goals. It is a team game. Xavi rarely ever scores but I would take him over Lampard 10/10 because he is simply a better midfielder and would improve the team. Look at Lampard's passing stats from last night - http://oi51.tinypic.com/i71vdv.jpg 20 misplaced passes. Why is he giving away the ball that often?

That video just goes to show just how dumb some of our players are. Why on earth did Anelka attempt a long ball across the pitch when Ramire is right there infront of him unmarked? Or why didn't he run into the acres of space infront of him with the ball? That was a brilliant chance of a counter attack wasted by the sheer stupidity of Anelka.That is the kind of stupidity that is costing us games, too many of our players play with their head down and fail to spot simple gaps to pass through.

Exactly my point.

Even at his best he isn't/wasn't very creative. Lampard is like Vdv, his game is about running and finding space and arriving unexpected to the box. We need to move away from this style of play and find ball playing midfielders with technical ability to pass interact well with their forwards. Lampard is a great player but if this is his last season as a Chelsea player I wouldn't shed a tear.

The things that excite me the most about McEachran is he seems to technically very good and cool under pressure. Only Mikel in our team meets that description, all the others seem to have a complete meltdown as soon as they get pressure from the oppisition and end up giving the ball away or taking aim at goal from 40 yards. The amount of times Lampard and Essien try to force balls that are simply not on is just incredible and then on occassions they can't even make the simplest of passes Jesus wept. If we had midfielders that built play we would be so much better. Here's another video enjoy

Our midfields take 5 touches each to control the ball and pass it along, in that time the opposition have got back into position. Watch this video and look at how quick and sharp the passing is. All one touch, passing through gaps and players moving to space. Even Arsenal are capable of doing this. We have an unculutured midfield full of runners with little technical ability.