EskWeston

Chelsea have made it to the final of the Milk cup in the Juniors section which i believe is an U15's tournament. Big achievment for the lads and after seeing an interview the other day with Neil Bath it seems that winning cups at youth level is starting to become something of a habbit. Which just goes to show how far we have come as an academy. The team taken to the Milk Cup can be seen here: http://www.nimilkcup.org/?module=datalistdetail&itemid=50c61b4a-01d6-4030-860c-f1c09943c2bf Only names there familiar to me are John Swift and Reece Mitchell although i am sure that Mitchell Beeney is a relation to youth goalkeeping coach Mark Beeney................... look out for some of these neames in the next few years. The results of the competition can be seen here: http://www.nimilkcup.org/?tabindex=23&tabid=3575 They play Cruz Azul in the final, and Chelsea have made pretty light work of the tournament so far so fingers crossed they can win this one.

This one seems to be turning into another typical Chelsea transfer saga, lets just hope this one doesn't go sour because we really could do with a midfielder like him now...

There is seriosuly no way we could sign Luiz, even assuming that Carvalho leaves, with JT, Alex and Ivanovic there is no way we could accomodate another top class centre back. We need to be using the extra squad place to blood players like Bruma, Mancienne and Hutchinson not forking out millions on transfer fee and wages for a bench warmer.

Will be a fantastic experience for him, will be interesting how we handle Bruma now, do we send him on loan somewhere? I think eventually he will have to go on loan for a season maybe in Europe to get some serious playing time under his belt.

Closest we could get ATM is Lukaku and it would appear that some point in the future he will be a Chelsea player i am sure. But that isn't to say that Sturridge cannot be top top class for us. Given more playing time this season i think Sturridge can come along lots and be an important player for us.

The reserve lads always seem to lose these games pre season, Wycombe will be starting their season sooner and will be fitter for that. However we did have some quality players out so a bit of a dissapointment although i am sure the scoreline doesn't really reflect the match. Seems that Sinclair is doing his best to get noticed and given a chance and Di Santo is doing the opposite good to hear Sam Walker doing well, i have high hopes for him, very good keeper.

Only a few will be going, McEachran and Bruma that i know of for sure, not sure on any others.

It's a reserve team friendly. Will be full of all theyoung players not going to Germany. No idea what players are going to Germany yet though. I would think if this games involves any of the older players Di Santo, Sinclair ect.. i think it will be a good indication that they are not sticking around for next season.

Always good to see us improve the quality of the staff at Cobham, hopefully he can bring some good ideas into the mix.

I think that Ramires and Neymar are realistic targets for us at the moment. The Torres roumer won't go away either. It is hard to know what our policy is as the club keep everything very close to their chest. I would be quite happy to see Ramires and Neymar come in and if we do add Torres to that it would be a significant statement for next season.

Trouble is getting the ball to them though with a diamond, always the same problem we pass and pass with little penetration when we play with the midfield diamond. Would love to see Torres and Drogba paired up, but it's what happens behind them that worries me, if we can get it right we would be pretty unstoppable.

From an article i read it would appear that we have to pay Benfica the full amount. It is then down to Benfica to sort out what they pay to Joorabchian, and once all that has been dealt with we can announce the signing.

Don't forget that players under the age of 21 do not need to be registered, we can have as many U21 players as we want. So players like Bruma, Kakuta, Borini ect.. do not need to go onto the lists.

We really shouldn't be in for a centre back, as has been said numerous times we are fully stocked there with quality talent and no way could we bring anyone else in.

We would never sign him without getting all that sorted, and the PL wouldn't let us either...

This story is really starting to gather momentum now. Torres is clearly a quality striker, but i have always said that i can't see where we would play him. What it does mean i am sure is a return to playing 2 upfront, which would mean the midfield diamond as neither Torres or Drogba can play out wide and you wouldn't drop either of them. I am not a fan at all of the diamond if we do go that route we are going to need a spectacular player to play behind the forward and make things happen because we will be lacking from wide positions.

I assume that this would be a role completely separate from Frank Arnesons. It would seem that his chief responsibility would be to oversee player aquisitions which would be a good thing to have someone like him to deal with that side of the business because someone like Gourlay isn't ideally suited to that role.

I think everyone will be available for this game at last. I am sure the players who come back today though will only have a small involvement. But it will be good to get a proper pre season underway. Will be good to hopefully get Benayoun involved at last and see how Carlo wants to use him. Hopefully we can continue the involvement of some youngsters, especially the ones Carlo plans to keep around. Should be an interesting game.

The thing is though, do you hoestly believe the club do not want to sign Aguero or have not thought about it? It has been fairly common knowledge that we want to sign him as a club. Clearly there is more to it, either the asking price is too high, the wage demands are too high or we ARE doing a deal and managing to keep it nice and quiet. Things are never black and white.

It would be lovely to have Casillas and Joe Hart as our back up keepers wouldn't it? We are NEVER going to get a keeper with the quality of Cech to be back up. All we can do is to bring through some talented youngsters which we are trying to do with Delac, Taylor and Walker but it takes time. Even if we discuss David James.... does anyone really think he would come here to sit on the bench or probably 95% of the games. Same goes for basically any keeper wo could "challenge" Cech for a starting place. Cech has small injury and Turnbull and Hilario have served us well, we won the double with them after all. Yes Turnbull had a shocker against Ajax, it happens sometimes in Pre Season. It is amazing what a pre season game without all but 2 of our first team players can do, suddenly we stuffed because our keepers are pants, our younsters are s**t and if we don't make 5 £50m signings then are going to get relegated.........

Don't understand the criticism of Bertrand, probably been our best player of Pre Season so far, did brilliant played out of position yesterday and i am very keen for him to be Ash's back up for next season. Quality player. Quite simply - Stoch wanted to move on and get played every week. The club couldn't really stop him and made good money off him. Our youngsters are quality and to judge any of them on the Ajax game is just plain wrong, it's attitudes like that and a lack of patience from fans that stops young talent coming through the club. If players are not ripping premier league teams apart at 18 years old they are deemed useless..................

Needs to get more games this season to really kick on, but he is certainly a talented player and always working to make things happen.

Well not the greatest of games for sure, but it was a very good workout for the team. Ajax with a stronger team and further along in their pre season i thought the team did pretty well all things considered. Very young defense to start with but did OK. Thought Billy Clifford did well, but has a lot more to offer still. Bertrand had another good game even though he was played centre back, have been impressed with him so far and really hope he is kept around. Matic had a decent game also, and improvement on the Palace game, and once again Sturridge looked very lively. Di Santo i am very dissapointed with, he has lost one of his best attributes, he used to work his backside off and run all game long trying to make things happen, that it not the case at the moment. Again though i really don't like the midfield diamond, we don't function as well and the player at the top of the diamond always struggles to get involved with the game. I know we are restricted because of the players we have available but i hope we continue with the 4-3-3 come the start of the season. I don't think we can be too hard on Turnbull for the 2 mistakes he made, pre season is the time for mistakes to be made.

Benfica midfielder Ramires will join Chelsea next week in a £20 million deal, according to ESPNsoccernet sources. Carlo Ancelotti wants the defensive midfield player having lost two experienced stars this summer in Joe Cole and Michael Ballack. Deco is expected to follow with only Liverpool's Yossi Benayoun coming in so far. Ramires is now heading for Stamford Bridge with the deal virtually done and expected to be finalised in the next few days. Ramires, 23, was one of the big successes of Brazil's World Cup campaign as they reached the quarter-finals in South Africa. Dunga, who was ousted as coach after the country's exit, stressed that Ramires was badly missed after suspension ruled him out of the 2-1 defeat by Netherlands. Ramires is also wanted by Manchester City, who are ready to outbid Chelsea, but a source said: "He has opted to go to Chelsea, and the deal can be done in the next couple of days, certainly by next week." Benfica president Luis Filipe Vieira has met with intermediaries representing both Chelsea and Manchester City, but the player has chosen to move to the reigning Premier League champions. Bayern Munich and Barcelona have also been linked with the player but the two English clubs have the financial resources to make the deal happen. Ramires said recently: "My agent has told me that a number of clubs are interested in signing me, but this didn't surprise me. We all know that the World Cup is the perfect stage to prove your worth. "One good game could be enough to attract the interest of a big club. I don't know the names of the clubs that are after me, but it would be a dream for me to play for a big club such as Barcelona, Real Madrid or Chelsea." Source: ESPN

Excellent for Billy Clifford who was injured for the last game. Good little right back he is and hopefully can put in a good showing...