CHOULO19

What Benayoun said is that he doesn't care about Chelsea and the difference is that it was not just a statement; this attitude was mirrored in his actions whenever he played for us. As for Lukaku, yeah he probably should have answered differently, but he was probably thinking that this reply would get some Everton fans cheering for him already and that by the time he plays for Chelsea again the Chelsea fans would have long forgotten a silly comment he said on Everton TV.

Still, the "Chelsea is better than Tottenham in every aspect" is just rude and highly unprofessional.

Anyone else think he's been talking too much since he arrived? I mean he hasn't even played in a Chelsea shirt yet. He's overdoing it, imo. Needs to be quite and let his football do the talking.

I know, right?

I don't get why we're making an issue out of the wages, surely Nathanial's development is the most important thing here?!

Girl friend. He could always get her to move here where he has several Belgian team mates including friends from Genk.

He won't be given a starting spot without playing a single minute of football for Chelsea no matter what his rating on FIFA is. Like any other football player on earth he will have to fight for a place in the team. It's really not an alien concept.

His teams are always play a very tactical game. For example how they press in phases and how the players move on defense to mark passing spaces instead of players is not exactly typical. Player movement and passing on attack is also straight off the drawing board with the team sometimes executing a system of calculated 10-15 passes just to created a space for one player. Almost everything they do is drawn by Martinez as opposed to us last season for example when we main just relied on the natural ability of people like Mata and Hazard.

I've seen a few Europa League matches and he looked "uninspiring" to say the least. He's been away from the top level of football for 3 seasons, so like Jason said, it's best not to get our hopes too high before we see him play. Pessimistic old man level 1000!

I've probably missed less than a dozen Athletico games since he's joined them and no, I don't think he's as good as Cech who I think is currently the best in the world. Like I said, Thibaut will likely come here and challenge Petr for the spot, if he really is better then he should win it i no time. If he isn't then he just needs to keep improving till he is. The comparison with De Gea was just in the situation, not their skill as I clearly stated.

Courtois had a great game in the Copa Del Ray final, but that doesn't even compare to Cech's performances in the CL. There is no denying that he is capable of the amazing but it's just how often can he do it and with what consistency. In that cup final game, he made two stunning saves: one an incredible recovery save from Ozil after he had miss-judged the cross and the second, I can't remember from whom. But can he do the 10+ incredible saves that Cech did against Barcelona over two legs? Or go the right way for 6 pens saving three of them? Let's look at the recent Super games. In the European super, Cehc kept on making amazing saves fro 30 minutes of extra time. In the Spanish super, Thibaut made a couple of excellent saves, then let a very soft Neymar goal in. That's the difference. 1) Why ever not? He will get games and if he proves to be good enough he'll get more games until he becomes first choice. 2) De Gea and Lindergard. 3) Haha you're quite a dancer and I personally have never been able to dance. I've made my point very clear about this and no amount of dancing will change that you can objectively say that we would not have won the CL without Petr Cech. And that's just the most important example, I can give plenty more examples. 4) Nonsense. Keepers win their positions in training all the time. I just gave the example of Thibaut himself winning the first spot at Athletico in training. This is really what it all comes down to. If he wants to play for Chelsea he will have to come here and prove his worth. Again, just like Schurrle moved from a main role at Leverkusen who are also in the CL to a smaller role here so he can have a chance to prove his worth and be first choice at a top club like Chelsea. This is what all professionals have to do.

1) He will get his chances in the Carling and FA cups and some CL group matches and when Cech is injured or needs resting. That is more than enough. If he puts on performances that are better than Petr, he gets the spot. He also has all the time in the world to out-perform Petr in training. 2) And how do you know Barcelona won't buy a second keeper with Courtois to challenge him? No one gets a guaranteed spot at a top team. Every professional knows he has to fight for his place. It's not just for keepers. All players come to a bigger club to prove how good they are. Managers challenge players, if you think you are better than the players we have, come here, prove it and get the starting spot. That's the same reason why Andre Schurrle, MVG, Willian..etc moved here. 3) LOL you can joke around the subject all you want but everyone knows that you put any keeper in the world instead of Petr Cech in the 2011-12 season and we would not have won the CL. That's the difference between the best in the world and "not far behind". Asenjo was as highly rated as Thibaut was when he moved to Athletico and if Asenjo has been better than Thibaut in training he would have gotten the starting spot. Every manager chooses who he thinks is the best player. It's that simple.

Either thye are going to be surprised or we will. I have no idea if we're going to see Inter's Eto'o or some average striker from the Russian league. I honestly don't.

1) The point is, we don't have to suffer like united did because we have an experienced world-class goal keeper who can still be our number one until Thibaut is ready. 2) For a season, yes. He won't make a career of it. He's still very young and will have to fight to make a name for himself wherever he goes. 3) Don't avoid the point, you know as well as I do that had we had Courtois and not Cech we would not have won neither the CL nor the FA cup and we would not have been able to qualify to the CL and we would not have bought the likes of Hazard and Oscar and our current squad would not have been the same. Of course Courtois can be a good first choice keeper at a top club but he's just not the best in the world atm, Cech is and the above example is how much difference that can make.

Like I said, I'm not comparing him with De Gea, just the situation. Although when De Gea moved to united he was as highly rated as Thibaut is now. De Gea cost united a lot of points. He was even dropped by fergie for two months last season because of his poor performances. They threw him in too early and he wasn't ready and it has cost them at times. He'll win his spot the same way that Petr Cech won his. By taking advantage of the chances that he is given and you are forgetting that there is also training where he can prove his worth. What can we lose if we get rid of Cech when Thibaut is not yet as good? Just imagine we had done that before the 2011-12 season.

So was De Gea when United bought him and I bet they wish they had an experienced world-class keeper along with him these past two seasons. I'm not comparing the two keepers, just the uncertainty of the situation. Courtois is not the most talented keeper around, he's the keeper with the most potential. Anywhere he'll go he'll have to fight for his stop. I think he'll come here next season and we won't sell Petr. He'll get a lot of chances and if he's really as good as or better than Cech, he'll win the starting spot and we'll probably sell Petr at the end of the season. If he isn't and Petr remains first-choice, we''l keep them both until Thibaut becomes ready to be a starter.

Logic has failed to apply to the Lampard selection so far, so I wouldn't count on it.

Not true. The game against united had tons of quality. Not on the ball but still quality that is hard to find. Both teams were incredibly disciplined. You could at almost any time see the shape that the manager drew for the players being implemented on the pitch. It was like a FIFA match with every single making the right movement almost every time. It also had quality with the amount of work-rate and defensive runs that every player from both teams made. It was a tactical master class especially from Jose who manged to frustrate united and stop them from creating almost any chances. Today on the other hand, the tempo was just too slow. No one trying to do anything with the ball. There were spaces and frailties in both defense but neither team had the quality to exploit them.

Frank deserves much better than this game for his 100th game. Shame.

Well he is a manager and tactically our game against united was one of the best you'll see in a season. No idea what he was talking about today, though. The game was just uninspiring and lacking any sort of quality from both teams.

With the current team, the quarters would be an achievement if I am honest. Well achievement is an exaggeration but it would be a good result. I honestly doubt you'd reach that if you play attacking football. I mean think about it, take Rooney (and perhaps Carick) out, who from England would get into the NT of Germany? Italy? Brazil? Spain? France? Netherlands? Argentina? Heck even Belgium? Those are 8 teams who have more quality. So getting into the quarter finals ahead of one of them is a good result, imo.

The funny thing is, I think, if he can get you out of the group stage, Woy will probably do well with the team. You'll probably still play incredibly boring football, but that will probably get you to the quarter finals or even semis if you get some luck.

What a boring international football day

He just made a mistake and gifted Italy the equalizer

He won't have a guaranteed start anywhere he goes. Even at Athletico he had to fight for his spot with Asenjo. PS: Cech is having an incredible game for the NT against Italy atm. Czech leading 1-0 at HT.