Bir_CFC

That first time pass to Neymar between two Chile players while running at full speed was amazing. My jaw dropped. If only Neymar didn't fail so hard it would have been a beautiful goal. Willian makes everything look so easy.

Nice run and cross. He's a good crosser, always puts in dangerous balls when he gets wide.

in other words you have no idea who we should sign??I can give you a list of names but I'm trying to stay on topic of Lukaku and how he fits into our team. Don't really see a point of making a list, unless your point is that Lukaku is the best striker in the world or that there are no strikers in the world that can play for Chelsea. As far as the list goes, I'd love any of Rooney, Lewandowski, Cavani, even Dzeko and Mandzukic would improve our striker force mabutssively. But no point discussing this right now. I would have also liked us to be in for Tevez last summer, can't believe how cheap he went to Juve. Think he would have been perfect for us for at least a few years.

who would be the perfect fit for us ,, and who is the nearest that might be available????Until we find one, we'll have to make do with a suboptimal strike force and Lukaku would be part of that. Lukaku has a future here for sure, but if it's as a first choice cause we can't find a striker that suits our system then it won't be the ideal striker force but that won't stop us from competing, it hasn't before and it won't in the future either but it's still a bottleneck. That said, imo our pivot should be higher priority. We can make do with what we have this year and Lukaku and Torres for next year isn't the worst either if we can't find someone.

I never said he's not ready. In fact in my post, I said that he would have got a lot of minutes with us had we not bought Eto'o. But I also think he isn't good enough to be our first choice striker and it's not cause I think he's not ready, it's cause I don't think he's the type of striker that would flourish in our system. If he was 28 and in his prime, my point still wouldn't change, it all still applies. I just don't think he's the best fit at the moment and we seem to be waiting on him so he can fit but I don't think he ever will, he just isn't that type of striker. And, I mean best fit as first choice, I think as second choice he's amazing for any team, couldn't ask for any other striker to come off the bench and just run at opposing defences and just cause all kinds of troubles. But with our patient, high possession build-up he just doesn't fit imo. If we play counter-attack then he would fit imo, he'd be perfect for that type of system.

At this point in time, we shouldn't be judging Lukaku by the number of goals he's scoring (we all know he can score) but rather if he's improving in areas that are expected of him to be able to lead the line for Chelsea. I'm looking at his back to the goal play, his link-up play, his aerial ability, his first touch and sadly he has not improved much in these areas since last year! Now, either we give him more time and see if he can improve or we just concede that he isn't that kind of striker. He is a striker that would rather run in behind and at defences (like Old Torres) instead of a more complete striker like a Drogba (which seems to be the only type of striker that could work at Chelsea). If so, he will still have a large role to play for Chelsea but I'd reckon it'd be as a squad player (second choice) instead of first choice striker. And, I think this would have happened this very year but with Eto'o joining there just wasn't enough minutes to go around and Chelsea made the unselfish decision to let him go on loan to get him more playing time.

I'd never understand why you'd sell such a versatile player like Ramires. I can understand arguments for trying out different players for our pivot and turn Ramires into a squad player instead of having him as the only reliable midfielder but to sell him outright makes no sense to me. He's the ultimate team player.

I don't think either can be homegrown. Isn't it 3 years at the club prior to them turning 18?

We need to look at some English players. Cole and Lamps will possibly be leaving as soon as next year, we'll be forced to decrease our squad if we can't field enough homegrown players.

I thought him and Mikel were actually very good defensively, both were pressing not just Ramires. It's offensively that they were a bit lacking, especially in the first half. Second half I thought Ramires did a good job of breaking lines by running with the ball. On a separate note - One things for sure though, Ramires should be the primary attacker from the pivot. That said you'd really prefer if both pivot players could alternate. Lamps can do this but he just can't help control the midfield as much as you'd like from your pivot player. Of course neither can Ramires on a consistent basis, so it's just tough to have a good pivot as none of them complement each other, nor are any the kind of players you'd want in your pivot in the first place.

Imo Lamps best asset right now is his goal-scoring ability, and not his passing, defending, running, workrate etc. So he should be playing closer to the goal not farther. That said though, if he's going to be used as a CAM then it'll be down to sub appearances only for when we need goals cause if he starts there then that position requires him to be able to play in tight spaces and be good on the ball, both things that he not good at anymore. Hell, I'd even play him as a striker considering he'll probably need the least amount of scoring chances on our entire team to get a goal.

Wouldn't say he has zero vision, but def not as good as our other AMs. Mata, Willian and KDB are all more creative than him.

That second goal was classic Eto'o, world class first touch and a ruthless finish. For a guy that has had so much success and made so much money, he comes off incredibly humble.

Lamps with a sweeeeeet pass and BAAAAAAA, another striker scoring!

gotta say willian's gotta be one of the most graceful people i can remember seeing on the ball, he glides across that pitch likes he's on roller blades

cech sexy save, willian sexy burst of pace, etoo sexy first touch and shot

Team is set up to play a fast paced match but we cant seem to string together 3-4 passes together. If you can't pull off a fast paced match then why not just play Mata, at least he can keep possession and is always a threat to create something out of nothing.

Same, hate him with a passion.

Another "believe" goal for Chelsea lol

We gave United much more respect and rightly so given the fact they are league champions and Michael Carrick excels when given space. He wanted to condense that space and not risk exposing it. Think we conceded a fair amount of goals against United that past few seasons and Jose wanted to make sure that didn't happen. We got a point at Old Trafford, only time will tell if that point will be crucial for us. Spurs are Spurs. Jose despises them just as we fans do and he always approaches the game 'not to lose', which has been proven to work masterfully for him. He is back in a country and league that he has been absent for several years from. He's getting the feel back and I'm sure he will learn from experience as history always shows that Jose always gets the last laugh. Plus I think the United match came a little too early for us. If it came now I'm sure Jose would have still been compact but would have had better attacking tactics to snatch a win. He didn't know his team now the new United at the time.

Seems like everyone is overreacting to me. He's just in a bad run of form. And I don't know why he's getting so much shit for the Newcastle match, if anything he showed leadership by taking upon himself to try to create something when the midfield was failing so bad.<br /><br />Plus people and Jose keep preaching proactive football instead of reactive football and if that's the case then I don't see how Luiz doesn't make the team often, just gotta get through a rough patch and it'll be fine.<br /><br />Now people even claiming he needs to adapt to England lol. He was our best CB last year, and it wasn't even close. <br />

Meh, I don't buy any of the excuses for the Newcastle loss. That we are in transition, had no width, didn't pass to our AMs, didn't take our chances, or whatever. Considering our run of form, our play and the supposed high morale we should have won that match or at least put in a better performance. It was a failure by everyone, from Jose to the players. Just accept it and move on, no excuses apply imo. As far as discussing the match, Jose should let his FB overlap as others have mentioned, not sure why he's so cautious against even pub teams. And he needs to do what he says he's going to do and only start players who deserve it (Cole and Lamps shouldn't have started that match based on form and the performance of the players against Arsenal).

Every time I've seen KDB, I don't see any reason why he should be a CDM. He is a very good passer and has awesome technique, but he is way too aggressive of a passer and oftentimes as a CM you need immense restraint over your creative instincts when you just need to help set the tempo and just recycle possession which I don't think KDB can do. This is not a slight against KDB because he's an AM and he doesn't need to be able to do this if he stays an AM but if he is to become a CDM then you're asking him to curb his natural creative instincts which is very very hard to do. And I know he played CM for Genk, but that isn't the same. Genk didn't need to be patient and just keep possession or set tempo in games cause all their games were like cup games during the period he played CM. The games were much more open than they'll ever be at Chelsea. Oscar is the only one from our AM that can play as a CM if needed because he is the only one whose natural game is similar to that of a CM.

Dude almost took Lloris' head off. That was scary, can't believe they let Lloris continue. Lukaku had a very very bad game though.

Lamps & Cole were shocking. Neither deserve to keep their place after that performance.