CHOULO19

No surprise at all that Sunderland won since Southampton played mostly their B team. Good result for us.

Yeah, but where's the fun in that?

I think I actually prefer Cole not even getting in a position to cross to Iva's horrid crossing.

Imagine if you somehow managed to piss them all off and they all decided to charge at you at the same time.... Glad you had fun and that didn't actually happen!

What's so bad about that? Jose is 50. His son is probably the same age as Hazard.

Hey, I'm not here to judge...

1. What are you expecting from Chelsea? Will you win the league? I expect we'll be challenging for the title till the end. Still too early to pick favorites now, but it definitely won't be a 15-20 points gap between us and first place like the past couple of seasons. 2. What do you expect from WBA this season? A comfortable mid-table finish. I think it will be difficult to replicate the success of last season, but I think you'll be well away from relegation danger. You can definitely beat anyone on your day. 3. Jose Mourinhio rejoined Chelsea in the summer. What have you made of his second stint so far at the Bridge? Still early days, but it's going well. It was always going to be difficult because it is almost impossible for him to live up to the expectations due to his return because people and the media expect him to walk in and win everything with a team that has been away from competing on the title for a couple of seasons now. But his presence at the club alone is worth having him back. He is someone that just lifts everyone's spirit and enlists a winning mentality just by talking to players. He's also someone who handles the press very well and always wins the psychological battles. He's trying to build a philosophy at the club and I think it's going well so far. 4. His former assistant, Steve Clarke is currently at Albion. What did you make of his first season in management? Brilliant. A great success as I said above. Obviously the pressure now will be ten times more to replicate that success which would very difficult (especially without Romelu). But Steve is already proving to be a great manager. He's the best man to be leading Albion at the moment, imo. 5. You signed Izzy Brown from us in the summer. Have you seen him? How is his progression coming along? Saw a couple of times this season and he seems to have fit in very quickly and looks exactly what we needed as most of our best young attackers are out on loan (Piazon, Bamford..ect). I saw him last season with WBA as well and I don't think anyone can deny that the boy is both physically and technically excellent. Definitely keeping an eye out on his development. 6. What did you make of your clubs summer recruitment? Very good. I don't think we needed many changes except in terms of squad depth. We have a lot of young promising players and what we need is someone to help them develop. If anything, the only complain I have is that perhaps we made one signing too many in the attacking midfielder department which is causing Jose a few team selection headaches (and has some fanboys in a riot!). We still need a central midfielder, though. Such a shame that Van Ginkel picked up that injury at his age, but we'll need to sign a replacement. 7. What did you make of our summer recruitment? The additions of Anelka, Lugano, Sessegnon, Vydra, Anichebe, Amalfitano etc. Anelka I was very happy with, but for purely sentimental reasons, but I doubt he can fill Lukaku's boots. Sessegnon is, for me, the best of the bunch. Excellent player who is technically great but can also change a game and create something of nothing. Vydra I watched in the Championship last season. He can be excellent on his fay but lacks consistency. Anichebe is a good squad player, but not more. Lugano is a veteran and was once a great player, but he's a bit past it, may be? I watched in the Confeds and he was far from his solid best (got skinned by Obi Mikel of all people! ). Amalfitano I know nothing of, tbh. 8. What are your best/worst memories of games against West Bromwich Albion? Best memory is obviously the 6-0 at the bridge, although we've rather struggled against you in recent years. The worst is probably the defeat just before AVB's sacking or the 1-0 defeat under Carlo (Bosingwa OG ) 9. What side is JM likely to choose for Saturday's encounter? You guess is as good as mine. I expect little changes to the side that beat Schalke, but you never know with Jose. I can tell you that Cech, JT and Ramires start. 10. And finally, score predictions. The players will want to compensate for that defeat at Newcastle and take advantage of Arsenal playing united. I'll say 2-0 Chelsea.

I thought he was excellent, especially in the first half. His movement and passing were brilliant and defensive work was impeccable. Great to see him bounce back from Newcastle.

Well, did you go to your swimming lesson or watch the match? Don't leave us in suspense!

Jose to sign Mario? I don't think so... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dy3I8QzpvfU EDIT: Just remembered another one, in the league but I can't remember against whom. Inter were winning by a goal and Jose puts Mario on with something like 25 mins remaining. Literally 30 seconds later, Mario tries to track back but makes a lat challenge on a player at the edge of the box and gets a YC. He stands in the wall for the FK. Player takes it, Mario puts his hand out to stop it. Gives away a pen, gets a second yellow and gets sent off and Inter go on to lose the game by a goal!

Spain often don't even play with one striker and you want them to play with two?

Yeah, Frank can certainly produce when played in an advanced position (and out of the pivot) where he belongs. The assist was just sublime!

No, I agree, you're right. He's had a slow start, no doubt, but we all know that he has the ability to make some great performances. But even last season when he had some amazing games, he struggled for consistency, but he's still 22, I'd give him 2-3 years to find the consistency.

I don't expect more than a couple of changes. Probably one of the 3 AMs most probably. I think Hazard will start because Jose will be looking to show him that he's not upset anymore about him missing that training. Maybe Bertrand for Iva if he is fit. I don't think Azpi will start at LB because we need attacking threat against WBA at home.

Someone actually likes the "rape smile"?!! Each to their own, I guess..

Was surprised to see that he was playing the number 10 role, not Oscar. But he did it incredibly well.

Everyone will talk about the goals, so I'll talk about something else: This guy is the ultimate professional. Right at the end of the first half, someone slid on Eto'o from behind and caught him by the byline. You could see how upset he was at that reckless tackle, he quickly got up to his feet and walked up to the player; even the 4th ref thought he was going to clash with him and stepped onto the pitch to stop him. But Eto'o quickly regained his composure and calmly just helped the guy who had tackled him back on his feet. I also love how he runs to the fans when he scores. Trying to find a GIF of the celebration of his second goal, but can't.

Well he's free to make the comparrisons, of course, but you can't draw from that particular comparison the conclusion that last season he was better than this one.

What we desperately need is great good decent just not terrible corner takers!

Not fair to take his best performance from last season and compare it to the relative "bad" start he's had. You can compare it to the game against Bayern, though, for example.

Of course that's not my opinion! I was just showing you how your posts look from the other side Yeah, he had a bad start, but so did Azpi, Cahill and even JT. The goal had nothing to do with how Mikel and the team as whole performed because we regained control of the match long before Eto'o scored. From around the 15 min till the 90th Mikel consistently won headers, made tackles, kept and passed the ball under pressure, and most importantly combined very well with Rami to press the opponents in the center and force error from them; something we rarely ever see with Rami-Lamps.

Defended well, but his ability on the ball is just...

Those have to be the WORST two smiles in one pic I've ever seen! I don't think he would have started it Bertrand was fit.

Great finish, even if he did miss-kick the volley a bit. But he sure does love finishing in style!

United will beat Arsenal in the weekend. You heard it here first.. I'd say Arsenal to win 2-0!