Elliott

Jose bought new players straight away. No new manager will come in and completely replace the team, there's hardly ever any need, but they will always bring in a few players, players they feel suit their style of play and that is exactly what Jose did. He made the Chelsea squad his own by adapting it. Grant hasn't had the chance to do that yet.

1. Zola 2. Mourinho 3. Gudjohnsen 4. Duff 5. Jimmy Floyd

He's only saying that because he's a young Spaniard who's ditched his home town club for a big London club in England. The parallels are obvious.

Nah the Drogba slaggers are now onto Kalou. That's what it sounds like where I sit anyway.

RIP

In the end we were lucky to win. We should have buried the game before they equalised, we had enough chances, but our finishing was poor and Given had a decent game. Our actual winning goal was miles offside and we got out of jail there. First half we played pretty well though, Ballack ran the midfield effectively. Ratings: Hilario: 7 - Did well, made a few saves Belletti: 5 - His passing was awful at times, had a bit of an off day Bridge: 8 - Very good performance from Bridgey I thought Alex: 7 - Missed a few great chances, defended decently Ben Haim: 6 - Never looks convincing Mikel: 6 - I thought he did alright in the first half, but in the second half it died off Essien: 7 - Got the goal, played alright Ballack: 8 - He was great first half, but his performance dipped in the second Wright-Phillips: 8 - Shauny had a very good game, was very effective up the wing, but he showed his height with two poor attempts as headers. Joe Cole: 6 - I wasn't that convinced with Joe, I can't really think of what he did Kalou: 7 - First half he did pretty damn well, second half his performance dropped with the team's. Subs: Pizarro: 5 - Awful. No touch, no vision. Sinclair: 6 - Showed promise, but didn't get anywhere really Sidwell: 6 - Didn't get the time to do anything.

True that. I guess you play it by the player.

Grant may even feel he had a hand in that loss to Villa, he was around at that time after all.

Well I'm honoured to have been mentioned in a thread I never replied to. I've obviously left an impression on you, so my views count all the more I'm even more honoured to be called a "college boy". Most people seem to think I'm 25 or 30 or something. But if you think my contribution to this thread will be to defend Grant, you're wrong. Those were some bizarre substitutions, especially bringing on Sinclair for Ballack. Bringing on Pizarro was understandable - a change was needed, but I don't think bringing off Joey was the right option. We didn't just chant You don't know what you're doing, the substitution roused the biggest boo I've heard for a very long time. The average fans is indeed now turning on Grant, so perhaps his days are numbered.

Only one match?

Maniche had a really good World Cup after he left us too.

Guys I don't think he was completely defending him. He was just saying he didn't go into the tackle to hurt the player, because he knew people would come out and say that he did. We don't know that he didn't give Riccy a good rollocking in private. Public defence but private criticism is definitely the right way to go if you want to keep hold the respect of your squad.

They did change their minds, he's going.

Yes we do rely on Drogba too much, which is why we should be more positive about Sheva because we need to him to reproduce that performance for us again.

I think you've misinterpreted what he meant. What he meant was what BlueLion said, it's starting to look like we don't need to rely on Drogba when he's not around. Of course he's still the best option, but now we have Shevchenko putting in a world class performance like yesterday's and we may well have another world class striker on our hands like we had originally hoped.

Maybe you ought have specified that to begin with.

YOU shut YOUR mouth and stop spreading your diarrhoea. One guy is positive and you jump on him, how much of a prick are you?

Welcome to Talk Chelsea

I really hope your cynicism is proven wrong Cara.

Hence why this thread is a bit useless.

Having watched Match of the Day, Ashley Cole did not deserve to get sent off, in fact it wasn't even a penalty. It hit his shoulder! I suppose it's hard to tell whether it might have brushed his arm as it came down, but it was a really harsh decision and cost us 2 points ultimately. I really hope we can have the ban for him rescinded at least. Still, a draw was a fair result considering how bad we were in the first half so I'm not going to complain too much. Sorry to say Cara, but Riccy definitely deserved a straight red, that tackle was bad. He didn't keep his feet on the ground, he dived in out of the air and could have broken ankles with that challenge. By the letter of the law, Zat Knight also deserved to go. Illegally denied a direct goalscoring opportunity. Talking of Zat Knight and his old club Fulham, did anyone notice Antti Niemi's pathetic goalkeeping against Spurs? For the first two goals he just watched the goals slide in! I could have said those!

I feel the penalty itself was harsh never mind the sending off, I really hope the FA will rescind it, but probably not.

Pff, thank God. It was a brilliant match!

Don't know if you've noticed, but Ballack hardly ever gets a game because he's been injured. He's fit now and in good form, so he'll be playing a lot more, as will Shevchenko. Well, what a game. Entertaining, and we didn't deserve to win. We were absolutely shite in the first half, terrible. Villa were all over us, and whilst their second goal was purely a goalkeeping error, it's not like they didn't deserve to be 2-0 up. What an amazing lifeline for us for Zat Knight to be sent off and Sheva to knock that penalty in just before half time. Had that not happened, we would have lost this game 3 or 4 nil I'm sure, what an embarrassment that would have been! Looking at half time, I think we can be happy with a draw as a result, even though we have to be angry about the performance. I'll be glued to match of the day to see all the refereeing decisions, many of them were awful. The bald linesman running along the east stand was particularly awful, but it seemed in the first half as if the ref was giving all the decisions to Villa, eg Essien getting booked for a bookable tackle and then Reo-Coker not, and him ignoring the constant fouling of their wingers. Second half we came out well, and a fantastic goal from Sheva. And fantastic work again from him to set Alex through, great finish by him as well. Everything looked great, and then Villa step up with a superbly perfect freekick and awful defending from us, Laursen was totally clear. And then Riccy, what the fuck are you doing? What an awful tackle, it wasn't a surprise to see him walk and he totally deserved it. But we were still on level with them in terms of men so it was game on. Ballack duly struck a fantastic freekick and all we had to do was sit the game out... but no, we concede a penalty. I've no idea what happened, but it looked like whoever shot should have been the goalscorer, and I can only guess Ashley stuck his hand out to stop the ball going in. Blue Lion said this shouldn't have been a sending off, but if he blocked a shot into an open goal like I thought he had, a red card is the only option. I think this game has single handedly destroyed out title ambitions. Not because of the result, but because we have lost two defenders for three more games in an incredibly important period, along with a multitude of injured players... Makelele (apparently), Shevchenko, Lampard, Drogba, Malouda, Cudicini and Terry. And the African Nations men, Essien, Mikel and Kalou. And with Essien, my dad was saying that was his 5th yellow card of the season... is that right? If so, we've lost him for Newcastle as well. Jeez. Well, let's settle for 3rd place, and try and win a cup or two, eh? Player ratings: Cech: 6 - bad mistake, could do nowt about the other goals though and commanded his area well in the air Ferreira: 5 - had a bad game Ashley Cole: 5 - had a poor game and got sent off Carvalho: 5 - some of his passing was awful at times and then dropped us in the shit by making a stupid tackle and getting sent off Alex: 7 - He seemed to do ok defensively today and scored a good goal Essien: 7 - Did okay, got about a lot Lampard: 5 - He was poor today even for the short time he was on the pitch. He's the central cog in our machine, and he didn't perform so neither did we. Joe Cole: 6 - Just wasn't effective today, was very well marshalled by Bouma Kalou: 6 - All running and no end product Pizarro: 5 - Pretty poor, had no real effect on the game Shevchenko: 9 - Fantastic contribution, worked hard, tucked away the penalty, scored a fantastic goal and made a third. Best performance in a Chelsea shirt for him. Subs: Ballack: 9 - He drove our game in the second half, massive performance and a great freekick to add one more to his rating Wright-Phillips: 6 - Didn't really have the chance to do much Mikel: 6 - Didn't have the time to assert himself on the game. Man of the match for me is Shevchenko with Ballack a close second. Everyone else was poor to slightly above average.

This has been done to death. We know Jose is a better manager than Avram, Jose leaving was never anything about that.