CHOULO19

Nonsense! Can't wait for Pato to come on at HT then do his hamstring on the 47th!

Interesting stat:

This guy is spot on with everything he says about Bernie Sanders and perfectly explains why he won't win the minorities vote, and hence has no real chance for the nomination.

Excellent business by the board, raising his market value for when we sell him in the summer...

Hard to do since Spurs are going to win the league...

Factually incorrect. Frank Lampard signed a short-term contract with City with an to option extend in December till the end of the season...which he did. Let's not rewrite history.

Completely agree. I've made that point myself before. To date, imo, Baba's only good performance has come against PSG. Was thinking the other day, would anyone take Baba over Bertrand in their team? We really need not to repeat that same mistake with Ake and Kenedy.

Haha Right. TC gold, right there

Van Gaal

Haha That was at Bertrand, wasn't it?

Or we could bring back Ake in the summer...

We can always take up the permanent signing options of the Falcao and Patodeals and go for the ol' 4-4-Flop PS: @manpe wasn't it you who came up with that during the Torres era?

Because he doesn't want to? You can't force old Dutch men to do age-inappropriate jobs they don't want to do. That's called slavery and usually you'd need to move your headquarters to some Pacific island and get 10-year-old Chinese children for that...

Just seen the goals, Foster really gifted us the points, didn't he? Lucky, but I'm not complaining. But what where Courtois and Baba doing for their goal?!

Could only follow on an audio link but.....TWO IN A ROW BITCHES!! WOOHOOOO!

Pirlo on Conte: http://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/football/news/andrea-pirlo-warns-chelsea-players-7450594

Come off it Skip, no team has EVER won the PL with 1.8 points per match. Our performances and result have not been anywhere near title-winning standards either. I think 5-1 against Newcastle and City's reserve team has skewed many people's evaluation.

As I've explained in a later post, it is a fairly small sample under Guus, but still we are averaging 1.8 points per match, or a 68 point season, which usually wouldn't get you top four let alone challenge for the title. Even in the current season where all the teams at the top are dropping points, with an average of 1.8 per game we'd still currently be in 5th with 46 points.

That's a bit of an exaggeration, isn't it? I mean he's doing well, but not VERY well. He can be so frustrating on the ball at times and often over does it. But Allegri has utilized him tactically very well, especially in some of the bigger games.

That's a fairly small sample coinciding with a lot of the teams at the top dropping points unexpectedly. We're averaging 1.8 points per match in the EPL (18 from 10 matches). Over a season that would give you 68/9 points. Most seasons that wouldn't even get you top 4. Quality is subjective. What isn't is the league table. After 26 rounds, i.e. more than two-thirds of the season in, we have constantly been in the bottom half. We've been waiting 7 months this season for a magical resurgence that keeps getting more and more unlikely to come. Excuse me? Performance wise Tottenham have been above everyone in the league this season. I think we can objectively say that. And as I said Arsenal have a working system and a lot of chemistry, unlike us. United are having a equally bad season as us, but they will spend more in the market and have Jose who will have them punching 10 points above their weight. I'm sorry, but saying that there is NO CHANCE we will finish bottom half is just arrogance. We are currently deservedly in the bottom half of the table. There are no guarantees that we'll play well enough to rise to the top half in the last third of the season.

Well if you say so...Have a nice day.

The special circumstance is that we've been consistently performing like a a bottom half team. Even under Guus, our form would at best have us competing for top four. There are A LOT of teams well ahead of us. City will have Guardiola and the best squad in the league. United will have Jose and a huge budget. Tottenham have performed better than any other team this season and Arsenal have a homogeneous squad that has a lot of chemistry. All of those teams are well us. It would take a near miracle for us to beat all of them to the title next season. No top four challenge is much more realistic. No, I'd say our chances of winning the season next season is better than Leicester's was at the start of this season. But still VERY unlikely. At least 7th? That's optimistic. There is a genuine chance we finish bottom half. Most likely we'll finish around 7th to 9th. Think it will take an equally fluke set of circumstance for us to win the title next season..

The 'fuck' that I'm saying is that it is almost impossible to go from a bottom half finish to winning the league in the EPL regardless of how many players you buy. We have too many problems in our squad. It's just too big a step up to take.

Chance of what? Staying here with continued success for 10+ years. No of course not. No manager has that chance. Chance of winning the PL, definitely in the season after next. Don't think any manager can win us the title next season unless all the other rivals self destruct. Conte is a motivator (and a good tactician if often lacking a plan B ). His success depends on how well his motivational techniques work here. I think there is a very good chance that he gets the team and players punching above their weight but there is also a small chance that he fails here and gets sacked the first season. We'll just have to wait and see.

Conte expected to be announced within 10 days.