Tomo

Long may he reign!

You've answered your own question. He's been quiet but when it truly mattered he delivered the goods. If he can do the same in Porto his average season is completely forgiven.

And you think they will just be able to switch the flick back on? The fact we will have such competitive match sharpness will/should be a huge advantage and quite the leveller to them being superior. And not to mention we have a habit of pulling the rabbit out of the hat as underdogs (remember Munich, the 2018 FA Cup final or even Baku when people were getting their knickers in a twist over Emery's Europa record) while City have pissed ties they're favourite for up the wall. Liverpool when they were still a 70s points team test City's 100 points team three times on the spin. Solskjaer has won at The Ethiad three times on the spin.

Its not really double standards though, Mendy being at fault (or should be doing better) for goals is rare, Kepa makes a disturbingly massive habit out of it. Would I have pointed out Kepa should have done better if that was him? Possibly, but that would be because it was yet another in a massive catalogue of them instead of a relative outlier like it is for Edou. Mendy will get less slack when those moments come for the exact same reason Cech did and Turnbull didn't. I actually like Kepa as a person he comes across as a decent lad in his interviews and the squad clearly like him, however I also think an obese 70 year old man I sat next too on the plane back from Alicante last year is a decent guy, doesn't mean I want him in goal for Chelsea.

The Kepa fanboys are slowly becoming as bad as the Torres ones. Where was the same energy for Ross Turnbull?

"Chelsea fans had proudly sung about having ‘Tomori at the back and Tammy in attack’, we loved the fact that the jewels in our crown had come straight outta Cobham." Does he realise 50 percent of that duo were dropped by Lampard?

Twice now Leicester (once with Tielmens) has potential shooting situations but decided against it, no way do they not try their luck if that was Kepa, Tielmens especially geared up but quite visibily changed his mind in the last moment.

They have actually got a unique situation with so many players contracts running out at big wages, it will be a chance for Frank to bring in a few of 'his' type of player.

It may actually work out for him as an underdog. For all his greenness he did overarchieve all in all last season it's when the pressure cranked up he crumbled. It's weird thinking he may be a plucky underdog type manager given he was the total opposite as a player but still.

Ok then Ibra Pogba Kante Kova David Silva Suarez Pirlo Vidal Di Maria Aubameyang Yaya Toure Coutinho Off the top of my head examples of top class players in the most recent decade who went to clubs without UCL football. The idea we'll fail where Arsenal out of CL for ages or Liverpool under yesterday's man Kenny succeeded is hilarious.

It's beyond strange that the last time Leicester were at The Bridge was Mount's home debut. So so much has happened since then both at the club and in general life.

There in lies the big difference before we even get into anything else, Edou makes those crucial clutch saves in big moments, Kepa simply doesn't. Kepa has a history from being beaten from long range, how many goals has Edou conceded from outside the box? Xhaka and Gundogan (and even the latter was only just) are genuinely the only two I can think of. Kepa makes shots look unsavable and because of that teams are encouraged to shoot from long range, look at Liverpool for example, they scored long rangers against Kepa like a hobby and I noticed at Anfield this season with Edou in the nets they geared up to try their luck on a few occasions (almost as muscle memory) then realised at the very last moment that it probably wouldn't work this time.

If Bournemouth go up it will be exactly the same league as 19/20 bar Leeds instead of SHU. The parachute payments has closed off the top level to any little dreamer club (like Blackpool in 2010) and has turned the top half of the Champ pretty much into Premier League B. There may aswell be no relegation given how it's rewarded.

He's a weird one. I absolutely love his personality within the locker room and he's a lot better defensively than I expected but attacking wise he's just as meh as I feared, the lack of aggression going forward compared to the two Scots to name two prime examples is stark and he doesn't seem to have any real working relationship with the players infront of him (he didn't really work with Harvey Barnes either who's developed relationships with Castagne and Thomas very quickly). 15 years ago that could have probably been worked around but in the present era consistent attacking presence from fullback is crucial to successful teams. He's not bad by any stretch of the imagination but I just can't help but feel we need at the very least a different profile of player to rotate with him depending on opponent.

He himself confirmed Mourinho tried to hyjack the deal, all be it they were out of CL too.

I always laugh when people say "we can't attract quality players with out CL". There's a huge list of top class players who joined teams in worse positions than ours without CL, i mean peak Ronaldinho did for it ffs

Because it's not a one off, Kepa has been beaten from this range systematically since he's arrived here.

I wonder what Mendy's stats are.

The DM/DLP drifts inbetween the CBs for first phase build-up then the fullbacks push on and offer the width.

A while ago but the point is, if we knuckled down and accesed out options and properly scouted players we will almost certainly find a good fit somewhere, Klopp basically built his great team using that method. Furthermore I have got a lot of faith Kai can make that role his own so I'm not half as desperate for a marquee striker as others.

Last summer (Edou).

It's up to our recruitment team to find someone. There's always someone suitable out there especially for system based set ups like ours. I know it's a different position but if someone last year suggested Wesley Forfana as the big CB option the two reactions from people would have been "who" or "lol" and look at him now. As nice as it's been to have Silva here the former would have been an excellent addition in hindsight..

2008 was worse than even the worst case scenario this time. Dropped a whopping 10 points in added time which proved fatal for our title hope. Had one hand on the Fa cup with ALL the other big boys out and lost to Barnsley. Lost the league cup final to Spurs. Lost the UCL despite holding match point.

I remember a few years back Pellegrini controversially played Caballero in the league cup final and when quizzed about it he said (paraphrasing) that he would rather lose than break his word. Maybe Tuchel is of similar ilk?

What sums it up with Kepa is could you say it was an out and out howler that Tielemens goal? No, but on the same token if Kroos or Benzema scored at Stamford Bridge it wouldn't have been an Edou howler but he got there anywhere. It wouldn't have been a Schmeichel howler had Mount scored but he got there anyway. Top keepers make that big difference in clutch moments.