Tomo

^ Norwich did well to beat us in the final, they had a game plan and executed it to perfection, but is that the right thing to do at youth level in terms of players development? I think the opposite.It was like watching a re run of our first team play Barca. I think Boga has as good a chance as any at making it into the first team, he is a class above Kiwomya who has his moments but is a headless chicken if ever i see one.

But, but, but, Mourinho doesn't do young players

What has just got me thinking about Carlo, is if we kept him to this day, would he have left us for Madrid too?

I thought there would be a media frenzy the day Beckham retired no matter what country he was playing in, but no one has really noticed.

Im torn with what to do with this lad next season. Do i think he is ready to play for Chelsea? yes 100% he is but he will probably be rotating with a new forward (i would love to get Benteke, not going to lie, those two would sort our forward line out long term). Now he is fully established as West Brom's best forward he will probably be starting week in, week out next season and with it, he could get even better before coming back to us following the world cup (where he could announce himself to the world). One thing is for sure, he is going to be a top, top player for us for many years.

The thing with Torres is he took a pay cut to move to Liverpool and i think someone on here said he turned down becoming the highest paid player in Enlgland from City. There is many things Torres is, but a mercanary isn't one of them, if we threaten him with the Malouda treatment, then he is more likely to go than Malouda or Bogarde was, for example.

We never learn? a semi decent month after months of shiteness and were debating whether to keep him He has helped win the EL and scored the goal that clinched 3rd, that is as good as it will get for him at Chelsea so it makes sense to leave on a high and his value is probably the highest right now than it will ever be again. We must take advantage of that. He is not back, he will never be back to his old self i can't even believe this up for debate, near enough every Chelsea fan accepts that Essien is finished but there is still some that harbour this false hope for Torres. If Mourinho even attempts to bring back the Torres of old it could bite him in the arse.

If were going to play that game the form of Hasselbaink, Gudjohnsen and Cudicini was what saved us from a mid table finish in Ranieri's first season (and the Italian an almost certain sack. 3 guesses how many of those 3 he signed?

A bit late in response but Vertonghen in hugely over rated, his goal scoring covers up some glaring defensive frailties. Dembele tho i do agree with.

@TorontoChelsea, Doing exactly as expected would be a close title win, those two title win's were not close, we blown away the competition. No one expected us to be winning those title's with us ease, especially not with that Arsenal team around. I think the main point off the whole thing, is would Hughes, Dalglish, Sven or any half decent manager had similar success to Mourinho despite the money? and that is a resounding no. Which showes while money helps, you still need a manager who knows what he is doing.

Decision, decisions. Courtois should have that season on loan again at Madrid to play in the CL, he has earned that and needs to play in the World Cup, but after that is when the big decision has to be made once and for all. Now their is the argument on Cech has still years left but the key thing is has he? Courtois said himself in 2011 Cech might have to retire early due to his injury problems and yes i know he should have kept his mouth shut about club affairs but that isn't the point, there must be some truth to it otherwise signing the Belgium (no matter how good he is) would have been absolutely pointless (unless were planning a massive profit making exercise not even Levy would attempt). Cech looks fine now, but if the injury thing is true, that won't happen for ever, imagine just imagine if we sell Courtois and Cech then starts slowing down? A tough decision, that thankfully i don't have to make.

I agree with @Shogun, this has 0-0 written all over it and it's this type of season for us Arsenal will win 2-1.

Yes he may have inherited some good players and added to them also but every manager benefit's from players they inherit, Ranieri was saved from the sack in his first full season by the form of three players he inherited of Vialli. At Chelsea he may have had lots of money to spend and ofcourse that helped him win the trophies he did with us, but if it was just so easy to spend and win Dalglish and Hughes would still be in jobs. 07/08 started badly, but Jose left with us level with United, who started just as badly. Who was to say things would not have improved? Spending doesn't automatically mean success, a harsh lesson QPR have been taught. Jose came in 04/05. Manpe actually explained why Jose actually overachieved in his first two season's at Chelsea despite the money spent. This is his quote below. I accept he is not perfect but the pro's overwiegh the con's big time.

I don't think we were even that convincing in that little mini run we had at the end. We got 2nd because the three teams below us all bottled it at the same time. To think United nearly made it 4 and gifted us the league, imagine if that happened? they say you can't win a title by default, but we would have if that happened. What was scary is between the City and Wolves game i think our GD was negative, those title rebound games at the start upto and including the Blackpool match made our stats for that season very deceiving. We ended that season on 71 points, Tottenham could get 72 this season and miss out on 4th.

I mentioned above that the rumours that Cech may have to retire early cause of injury problem's aren't as far fetched as we think, otherwise their would have been no point signing the Belgium.

Another to add to the list of left Arsenal and won a trophy.

Didn't Aguero have a similar time out of the CL when City got him and we could have done the same? Instead we choose Torres who played in the CL recently.

I think the rumours Cech might have to retire early might be true. If the club thought Cech could do a VDS, this signing would have been pointless, unless it's a profit making exercise Levy wouldn't even attempt to pull off.

Infact i think it works as often if not more often than it doesn't, if not more. For one Dalglish there's a group like Guus, Jupp and Harry. By October i don't even think this will feel like a second coming.

Well Barca will be in for a shock if they even try it because we are not Arsenal.

Quick question to the fan's who hated Rafa because of his previous comments. As Rooney stuck V sign's to our supporters during the Old Trafford title decider in 2011. will he be getting the same level of abuse if he signs for us?

Yeah, hench the not as extreme bit I think the start he makes is crucial. A bad start and it's a slipery slope. Say he finds himself 5th/6th in October from a slow start and exit's the league cup to lower league opposition, loses the next two end's up in 8th. If you compare this United squad to Liverpool's 10/11 squad (United's is street's ahead), it wouldn't be dissimilar to Woy's struggle in terms of how much he is underachieving and how much the fans would get on his back. I doubt he will embarrisse himself as much as RH tho, when he called that 1-0 win at Bolton a famous victory :lol:

Hell win the double every season

People who think we would have done better with RDM are letting their hearts rule their heads. Now i wanted RDM to work as much as anyone (check my post's last summer) but as time went on it was clear that it just wasn't going to work. You say, well we sacked him too soon? probably yes we did, but it's better to sack someone too soon then too late. If we sacked Scolari a couple of months earlier, Hiddink could have recovered a title win out of that season, but instead we waited until it got beyond a joke under Big Phil and then on Hiddink (despite only dropping 5 points, and both those games we hit the woodwork in injury time) could only get us 3rd and even if we won all the games, still would not have won the league. The Juventus and Athletico game's were frightening, that was the worst beggining and end performance's from a Chelsea team since we went to Old Trafford under Big Phil and lost 3-0. Even the dark days of AVB and Carlo's second season we never performed so badly from the first minute to the last like we did in Turin especially. Under Rafa we have performed on the same level but under RDM would we have even carried on performing on the same level? our worrying erratic displays aswell as what happened at WBA (completely nosedived) suggest's the chances are we would not have. The City game especially would have been really really messy. Yes you could say results are identical but performances are not. Even in the games we fucked up in that he gets stick for (Southampton, Swansea, Reading, QPR) we dominated the games and didn't take our chances. We weren't dominating games under RDM, even at the start of the season our only truly impressive displays was Spurs and too a lesser extent Norwich (Arsenal game was won from two set pieces). The bad side of Rafa has been his substitution's which at time's have had me banging me head against a brick wall. He improved us defensively, we were all over the place in RDM's late tenure and looked like nothing was changing, Rafa has come in and made us into a unit at the back, ok not to the extent Jose did but better than before. Hazard's defensive work has also improved ten fold and Lampard imo has looked better under Rafa than he has any time since the Double winning season. Rafa has also treated every player by merit and has managed to do it without causing a dressing room riot (something we have been wanting for years, no?). I love Robbie always will, but sometimes in football you have to let your head rule your heart. Im not convinced he is a genius manager (like Ruperb or the Scousers) and if it's a choice of him or Jose then there is only one winner but i do think he has made some decent contribution's that Jose can built on and above it i think he is a very decent man who has handled this job with dignity, professionalism and class in the face of the abuse he has got, a lesser man would have walked away. Thankyou Rafa and good luck at you're next job, i will watch with interest.

This myth about giving him a Premier League loan to prove himself is as boring as it is a pile of crap. He has won the best keeper in La Liga, proved himself time and time again and were thinking of sending him somewhere like Southampton and Fulham when some of the top clubs in the world are interested in him, we might aswell send Hazard there too while were at it The PL is not some super league that you have to prove yourself in to be considered worthy, really the "players need time to adapt to the PL" is actually an urban myth, players like De Gea and Henry are the exception not the rule. Remember when we signed PL proven Torres over Aguero