EskWeston

It will be interesting to see how RDM sets up for this game. This game there will be many more players getting 90 mins, Torres will look to get about 60. So we can see what sort of team he is planing, obviously minus the olympics players. As it is Brighton you expect us to be able to play much better than we have in previous pre season games, but for me i am looking to see HOW we play, i would like to see a much better pressing game and quicker on the break.

I have to say it probably seems the right choice, De Bruyne in pre season looked like he needed more time at a higher level than Genk before joining us full time. Hopefully he will get the game time he needs there and improve himself. My only frustration would be letting De Bruyne go and keeping hold of Malouda - i know which one i would prefer to have available. If he gets the games it will be a good move, although i think the premiership may have been better but the club clearly have decided that they are not fond of loans to clubs in England....

I think we can expect to see more unofficial links like this. It has proven to be very worthwhile for us. We will never know the true extent to Romans and Chelsea's influence at this club but it gives us great oppertunities to send our players on loan there as we have done and as we are. Especfially as Vitesse are on the verge of the Europa League (although a tough tie against Hiddinks side).

If you look at one of our teams from 6 years ago, we had a lot of talent: Taylor Ofori-Twumasi Hutchinson Cork Bertrand Bridcutt Woods Fernandes Cummings Stoch Sinclair 2 of those are technically first team players, so on that side you have to say we are doing well. However there are three there who would have been decent squad players for us - Cork, Stoch, Sinclair. It is all about chances and development. The club have to manage the youngsters in the right way, but at the end of the day the first team manager HAS to at some point give them a chance...

What we should be doing is finding the best way to utilise the new talented players we have at our disposal. At the moment we have been unable to do that.

Thats right, Buying players like Oscar, Hazard and Marin are sensible signings for the club. It is when we have situations where Malouda plays ahead of Piazon or we play a player well out of position rather than play a youngster. It all comes down to trust, at Chelsea we seem to have a total fear of playing youngsters, firstly we virtually never give them a chance, and then when we do rather than telling to go out and express themselves they are clearly told to do the simple things and not give the ball away so they never show their true potential out of fear of doing something wrong, we should trust them and allow them to do what they do. Anyone who has seen what Josh McEachran can do on the ball will know that we have not even seem 50% of what he can do in the Chelsea first team.

The overall performances would still be pretty concerning though. At this stage it is all about getting systems and styles of play into place for the new season. On that basis we are looking not in good shape.

Until they are given the oppertunity to play they are never going to break through. Pre Season was a prime example, Josh played the first 2 games, looked really good in the midfield 2, composed and good movement, set up Lukaku well. Then we never saw him again for the rest of pre season.

I have to say there are some worrying signs from pre season, results mean nothing. But our play has been poor, passing has been generally slow and mis placed. We have not had the ability to get up the pitch quickly and involve Hazard or Marin as we should, by the time the ball is getting to them we have a wall of opposition for them to get through and it becomes so congested and tight that we can't work scoring chances. Basically it is old problems that we have not been able to get over. I hope things improve, but i have to say there are some not very good signs coming out of the pre season.

Based on what i have seen in pre season we are going to make things hard for us playing 4-2-3-1 with Mikel and Lamps as the 2 in midfield. It just isn't working and making things so hard for us get quick attacking moving up the park. I don't think we HAVE to change formation but i would be interested to see a personnel change and have Romeu and Ramires as the midfield 2, much more dynamic and quicker on ball, with a fluid 3 behind Torres of Mata, Hazard and Oscar it would be a really dynamic team. Ramires is much more effective in the middle of the park as is wasted out wide.

Another week comes to a close at the Chelsea academy and as always there has been plenty going on. It started last Saturday with a Friendly game for the U18’s against Bristol City which finished in a 4 – 0 win for the young blues. The goals were scored by Walter Figuera, George Cole and Jeremy Boga, who bagged a brace. The U18’s then hopped on a plane for Asia where they will play a couple of Friendly games before coming back to England and then up to Manchester United to play a few friendly games against some big clubs. Jumping over to America we saw some young players leave the first team tour after more senior players joining up. The players who returned home were Todd Kane, George Saville and Patrick Bamford. Bamford the only player to return disappointed having not managed to get on the pitch during the tour. The U21’s also had pre-season action this week whilst they were in Austria. A game against 1860 Munich saw a 3 – 2 defeat, Adam Nditi and Adam Coombes (formerly Phillip) with the goals for Chelsea. They have now returned to Cobham to continue their pre-season preparations. Demot Drummy was pleased with how the tour went, both on and off the pitch and feeling he has learned plenty about the players he will be working with for the coming season. Again this week we have seen Chelsea bolster their ranks not only in the first team but at U21 level. Talented new forward Eden Hazard has been joined by his younger brother Thorgan Hazard who is similar in playing style but not quite at the same standard. It was confirmed that he will initially join up with the U21’s but there is a possibility he may go on loan and I can only imagine it will be to a club in Europe. With no news yet of any league fixtures at academy level we have already had a small insight into what is to come. The exciting NextGen series has confirmed that they will reveal their fixture list for the coming season on Thursday 7th August. Obviously Chelsea already know who is in their group (Ajax, CSKA and Molde). There has been a number of clubs receiving their new academy status’s this week, Wolves, Sunderland, Stoke and Southampton among the clubs who have been granted Category 1 status, apparently only 12 clubs have been awarded category 1 status. There is still no clear outline as to how the leagues will be set up, but there is a possibility it will consist of 3 leagues with 23 teams. If this is the case it promises to provide the number of fixtures that these young players DO need. Coming up this week as well as the possible fixtures announcement for U18’s and U21’s will be 2 friendly games for the U18’s against the Tailand National U19’s and the Malaysia National U19’s, and the U21’s are playing a friendly game against Northampton Town. Click here to view the article

We surely need a right back and it would seem that Cesar is the man for us, i would expect this to go through after the olympics.

Fits the profile of the type of player we are looking for. Talented, quick and excellent vision. It really is good to see us bring them in at a younger age and let them develop with us. But lets see, we are linked with a LOT of players at the moment.

Surely more down to the fact that Belgium have a lot of quality youngsters coming through, Spain are the best national team in the world at the moment and brazil constantly produce top talent, stands to reason we would be interested in players from those areas. I doubt dressing room harmony is considered when looking at potential signings. No idea as to the reasons behind the Thorgan Hazard signing, i doubt it has anything to do with company for Eden as has a family of his own and a number of players from his country already at the club. At academy level we have seen us sign family members as sweetners for some top top talent (see the musonda and Angban brothers) this is also at a time when we are looking to build up the numbers in the squads available at that age too..

I think in all honesty De Bruyne will go out on loan for the season. I know Bremen are interested and we seem far more keen to send our players out of England for their loans but it would be far better for his development if we can get him to play regular for a premier league team...

I think that Hulk is still going to come, to have a player who can play out wide and can also play as a striker is what we need, especially if we are as i would expect now to send Lukaku out on loan. Torres is going to be the main man for pretty much all of the season (fitness permitting), so if we are going for a big name player then they need to be able to play other positions. Signing a young striker would be pointless as we would be just as well to keep Lukaku and have Torres, Sturridge and Lukaku as our striker options.

Always a hard one as a number 2 in all likelyhood is going to get very little game time. Personally i would be in favour of promoting either Jamal Blackman or Sam Walker over Hilario and Turnbull, both obviously younger but ability-wise are no different with the potential to be much better.

The results in pre season mean nothing. What has been most dissapointing for me is the lack on direction in our play. We have signed some quality wide and attacking players and we have failed to adapt our style of play at all yet, this is what pre season is for as much as fitness. We continue to be so laborious in our play, by the time it gets to one of our attacking players the opposition have too many numbers behind the ball for us to be really effective. So far we are looking in every game as if we are playing Barca or Bayern - get behind the ball and cautious play, not overcommiting. We really need to step things up if we are to be ready for the start of the season.

As far as i know we are not participating in the Milk cup and didn't last year either....

As the games draw on we will a see a more regular team come together. Terry, Cole, Meireles and Torres need more minutes still to catch up. Have been very impressed with both Hazard and Marin so far, gives us the options we have been missing.

It has been another busy week at the Chelsea academy, with pre-season match action, players leaving on loan and some new faces to meet. Starting with the match action the U18’s had their first pre-season game on Saturday morning against Torquay. They started their pre-season in style too by winning the game 12 – 1. With a game with that many goals there was obviously plenty of players on the scoresheet Houghton, Seremba, Figuera x 2, Boga, Rodriquez, Kandi x 3, Cole, Musonda and Ssewankambo. With basically a different team each half there was plenty of players on display including new boys Columbian Joao Rodriquez and Belgian Charly Musonda whose arrival was widely reported and tipped to be a big star. An hour later it was the turn of the U21’s team to get their season underway with a game against Northwood FC. The U21’s not being able to generate the same number of goals ended this match with a 0 – 0 draw. Again there were a large number of players used across the two halves and again there were some new faces to be seen. Ivorian brothers Vincent (Goalkeeper 27) and Victorien (Midfielder 18) Angban were joined by another pair of brothers Tika (Midfielder 18) and Lamisha (Midfielder 20) Musonda, older brothers of Charly. It was also the first game in Chelsea blue for Andreas Christensen who joined up this summer. The last match action of the week was back with the U18’s who played out a friendly at Cobham against London rivals Arsenal on Friday. In an exciting game with good football that bounced one way then the other it eventually finished with a 3 – 2 win for Arsenal. Chelsea’s goals both scored by Joao Rodriquez. The U18’s will be in action again on Saturday against Bristol City before they fly out to Asia for a couple more friendly games. In other news two young blues have moved to Portugal for the season and joined up with Vitoria Guimaraes. Exciting winger Milan Lalkovic will be hoping this loan will be the chance he needs to play regular first team football in a strong league. Joining him is Matej Delac, the young goalkeeper who has struggled to find a place to play football. Again it is strongly hoped that he will get the playing time he needs to develop himself after a long period of time without regular football. Stepping to first team level and the first game of pre-season in America against the Seattle Sounders. A number of young players were involved throughout. In the first half Nathaniel Chalobah started in a somewhat unfamiliar position of right back and Josh McEachran started alongside Mikel in a midfield two. Other than a sloppy pass which allowed Seattle to score Josh was very composed and played a good game setting up Romelu Lukaku for his first and Nathaniel Chalobah put in a good showing too. In the second half there was more involvement, Sam Hutchinson, Todd Kane, George Saville, Gael Kakuta, and Lucas Piazon all saw time on the pitch and all played well, especially Todd Kane and Lucas Piazon who both managed to look like they still playing in the reserves and not looking a little nervous. There is plenty more to come from the academy this summer even before the season kicks off. As I write this it would appear that the U21’s squad numbers will be increased even more with the imminent arrival of another brother, this time the brother of new signed Eden Hazard. Younger brother Thorgan is a player in a similar mould to Eden but not at the same level, moving from Lens to join up with his brother he will hoping to make an impact and improve to join Eden in the first team. Click here to view the article

Lets not blow a comment out of all proportion. Of course he was gutted to have not got on the pitch. But RDM will have had his reasons and him not playing in that game is going to have zero bearing in how his CFC career goes from here. The lad has only been here about 6 months.....

I think it pretty obvious that there will be some more players moving on this summer. We are putting together a very decent squad though i think,

Eden has a partner and a child, not too sure if the signing is to do with company. Having Eden on board just makes it easier for us to sign a player that was of interest to us....

That is quite a big assumption, we have no idea as to the level of Eden's involvement.