Tomo

feel free, you have every right to do so.

Didn't Kalou play up top a fair amount of games in 07/08?when we finished 2nd.

To be fair its not like he was a total novice, walked into Porto and easily got the better of Jorge Jesus (an experienced manager himself), on the pitch and the table. Ofcourse he has made mistakes but Carlo and Scolari both did and their expierenced gaffers. Fully agree with your comment about the fans however.

@BlueDutchy Regarding a top 4 finish i seriously think we should consider saying to Drogba (and promising him in writing) we will give him that 2 year deal if he plays a significant role in getting us in the top 4. I don't think its the right thing to do at-all but Gourlay should consider the cost's of Drogba's new contract against the prospect of missing out on CL football.

Im not even joking if it comes down to it we should sack some of the well fed players, if that isn't a clear statement that player power is a thing of the past i don't know what is!! For the youngsters point we can't judge AVB till he's been here 18 months, but even so far ive only been disappointed with the game time for Bertrand, throwing Hutch in is a big ask, McEachran would have played more if the season went to plan and Lukaku struggled at the start and had a bit of time in the reserve's and lately has looked lively when played, so i think AVB has got it spot on with Lukaku if im honest.

I would give you 1 million rep for that if i could. Both incredibly frustrating but Torres frustrates and we know he won't score, with Kalou no matter how bad he is playing we know there is a goal in him, thats the difference and for that reason alone ill have Kalou starting over him.

The job he has had on from the start was next to impossible, in the summer he took on a bunch of egotistical, past it, well fed "superstars" who have been playing the previous season in a casual mode i do when i play headers and volley's up the park. What will it take for every-one to realize its the players that are the problem, is it really going to take Jose or Hiddink coming back and struggling just as bad? Their last reign's Jose inherited a spine of players on the up, all he had to do what a little sprinkle of the squad with a few signing's and he was laughing. The squad when Hiddink came in were still in and around their peak, he done fantastic when he was here, absolutely fantastic, i still laugh at the way he royally owned Benitez and (unbeknown at the time) started Liverpool's downfall but he is no superman and as his spell at Turkey and Real Madrid shown, he isn't immune to walking around wondering what the hell to do when things start going wrong. How do you know it won't be any different with these group of players? This club has been riddled with player power for years, we spent most of last season screaming for Carlo to try and stop this player power and stamp his authority but it got even madder (Malouda getting haircuts at training, Cole bringing in a machine gun, a revolving door for visitors at the gate), AVB has come in and done his utmost to get rid of this player power for good, only visitors are allowed in if they have an appointment, no more Cole machine gun rubbish and no more revolving door. Yes AVB may have gone a bit to far in the Anelka and Alex situation, but it's better that than let player power get even worse no? Speaking of player power if AVB get's sacked, these well fed "superstars" have won again, they will start to believe they are invincible, if AVB goes we might aswel make all them joint managers and be done with it. Its time to show them this is Chelsea FC not (insert well fed "superstars" name here) FC and sacking AVB will make it twice as harder than it already is. The most important thing seem's (for me) to be that the group of players we currently have that are considered to be our future are behind him (DL4, Ramires, Romeu, Mata, Danny etc) there the future of this team, the well fed and past it "superstars" who want AVB out and are showing no effort whatsoever can leave, keeping them and making player power worse will be disastrous. It's no secret that SO FAR (in capital letters as those are the key words) AVB has fallen well below expectation's, but it's not like a season like this has came out of the blue, there has been problems with players in the team since 2008, all of our season's (bar the double) have been well below par for our recent standards. Also have you forgotten just how bad it was last season and that was under one of the best managers in the world. While there was a few (me included) who thought AVB's Porto momentum could have given us an outside shot at the title, i was always prepared for the worst case scanereo, which is not far off what has happened and thinking back at comments from August/September a lot of user's on here were prepared for this possibility. Right now our team overall is in a mess and something has not been completely right since 08/09, even in the double winning season we had some stinking performances, infact after the Inter and Blackburn double header (where we went out of the CL and lost our place at the top of the table) it looked like that season was going all wrong until the team somehow found that extra bit of hunger, energy and determination to get that double in the last couple of months (which ironically probably delayed the rebuilding process), it will take a while to get back to being one of the best in Europe if we do at-all, but it was our fault for not strengthening and adding to the squad when we were one of the best in Europe. In terms of the problem's we have at this club right now, AVB is a long long way down the list, and we cannot even contemplate sacking him until at the very least the well fed past it "superstars" have left. The double was a classic example of short term gain for longer pain, now we have to work it the other way, because letting AVB go before the ego's go will put us back to square one.

Both Academica and Porto were in a mess before AVB took over.

How football can change so quick, after the reverse fixture against Everton at SW6 we were tipped as title dark horses and AVB could do no wrong.

perfect example of something i say getting twisted.

Looking at some comments previous on this thread im finding it pretty funny how Anelka is all off a sudden a footballing messiah, he has been just as frustrating to watch in the last year and a half than anyone and keeping him would not have solved the problem.

Scolari inherited a team at its peak, AVB inherited a broken squad, cannot be compared.

Torres out of the lineup, who replaces him? aslong as some one does it can be Ross Kemp

I think its time we ask ourself's the key question. What is more likely to get us back to challenging for the title? Sacking AVB, therefore giving these well fed "superstars" "another chance" or Sacking the well fed "superstars" and letting AVB get his own players. Which is more likely to see us successful again? whether AVB is the right man for the job is still up in the air but we cannot make a fair judgement until (at the very earliest) this time next year.

Thought this was in the transfer thread for a second

Could be TEN points gap between 1st and 2nd if Madrid win the derby, just goes to show Barca can win as many battles with Madrid as they want but if they lose games like this they won beat them in the table.

Considering we were 5th last season also with i think even less points then no too early to say. We say AVB is naive but Carlo showed a fair bit of naivety last season, naming team lineups in press conference's, surely such a experienced manager saw the dangers in that?

To be fair apart from the last 2 and to a lesser extent the Mata one, hes got a point.

Josh seems to be playing in all Swansea's defeats atm Hopefully that won't count against him.

To think we could have had Saha for free, in our current situation we had NOTHING to lose.

What would have been the odds of a lucky tap in or 2 had Kalou played today?

My argument that Kalou should be brought back in to this team is getting stronger with every passing match.

There were signs the month before Wilkins left and if were honest if we was superman Scolari would still be our manager.

I would love it if i woke up tommorow and found out some of these players have been sacked.

The point im trying to make is Kalou does get the goals and he is a better option than some one who doesn't. If the chance against Norwich fell to Kalou and not Nando, its more than likely we would have been talking about a hard fought 3 points instead of 2 dropped.