Blue Armour

Returns to the pitch like a boss., after being out for more than 2 months. You always see a bit of ring rust in players who haven't had any match practice, but he comes back and starts pinging those long balls like it was 2014 again. Its almost like instinct.

The author of said article: I'm guessing his degree in creative writing helped him conjure up this article., but there could have been other influences.

Social media has become a plague these days....with fans pulling quotes out of their arse. Even without searching on web, you can tell that someone as savvy with social media as Cech, wouldn't make a careless remark like that.

Lol. [media]

I thought he played pretty decent. Winning a lot of free kicks.., again taking a lot of abuse from the opposition defense. Should have done better with his shot at Lloris, but was a constant threat, like his involvement for Moses goal. Tottenham were guarding him closely, but he didn't have to do too much in this match, with Diego pulling the strings up front.

Aw man, would love all these guys Drogba, Lamps, JC and AC3 in our backroom staff....not practical but still.

Like Conte said, he's our captain...whether he's on the pitch or not.

Lol...that's Messi in the pic though, right? Spoilers.....?

Pretty much like Drogba there...defender was struggling to hold him back! And any guesses who was wearing no.4 and giving the assist?

Yeah, I can't understand what goes in the heads of these players...ethics thrown completely out the window, no respect for fellow professionals. Its even more annoying when refs fail to give straight yellows for fouls like these (targeting specific players) For the first foul from Adam Clayton, he was also having his shirt held back by that DeRoon.

Mate, you should really keep asking the doubters the question...especially after a game like this last one. Was at the heart of most of our best moves in the game

Its been said plenty of times of late, but he has truly got us playing like a team again. Too often in recent seasons, you turn on the telly to see whether Hazard can turn on the style, or if we could get the odd goal from a set-piece, or who could come off the bench to turn around the game.....Now you see that there's a lot more combinations going on, Alonso, Matic and Hazard on on side, Pedro, Kante, Azpi and Moses on the other....And in defense you have Cahill and Luiz providing cover for our full-backs.....There just seems to be a better game-plan with players like Pedro much more confident in their decision making as a result.

With Luiz, despite the slip-ups he has made in the past, I have always felt as a defender his ceiling was far higher than most. When he's 1 v 1, versus an attacker, there's always that assurance that he won't back down from a challenge because he's not afraid of going into a tackle. No wonder he earned Aguero's ire in that match against City.

Yeah I remember it was Kante...or rather Kante preferring Chelsea because of Conte and his speech.

Odd,..was wondering why he wasn't showing up. Never saw him as the type to cause trouble, or at least disrupt the forum for others...

Influence of the Luiz...

The remarkable thing about our starting lineup right now, is that we have so much firepower/defensive options still left on the bench to call on during games. Batshuayi, Willian, Terry, Fabregas....

I know a lot of players do it, but it was nice to see Costa thump the badge in his goal celebration, especially after all that transfer talk at the start of the season.

Just saw this...and that's despite all the tactics employed by City's play-makers to feed Aguero (although the Argentine can create a fair share on his own).

A big man-little man combo in central midfield, and a big man-little man combo up front. Working well, that.

I was thinking about it, but I doubt Conte will just let him waltz back into the starting 11. On the other hand, for the benefit of squad rotation I do see the point of giving him game time now and then just to keep him match fit. The interesting thing for me was that when he came on, he moved to the RWB position with Azpilicueta still remaining at RCB. Would have expected them to swap positions.

I'm not sure how you think that's the case....he does have a lot of contribution going forward. Today he assisted Hazard, created another one for Hazard and Costa, and almost scored one himself. He also had a goal scored against Leicester two games ago.

Was it just me, or was he actually applauding Hazards goal when it went in.

Tbh, he seems to get better results (barring the big games they've played this season), when Mata is present. IMO he still doesn't try him out enough, even if its more of a chance than he got here. The main reason he reverts back to Mata is because the other options, namely Rooney, and now Pogba, are not delivering enough.