CHOULO19

One last tribute:

He can't expect a team to travel every other day and play a match in a different country.

Almost certainly going to Juve which I honestly don't get. They have Barzagli, Bonnuci and Chiellini; can't see him getting much minutes there.

I never understood the term "creativity" or who is in charge of labeling players as creative or not, so let me put it this way. He can do what Lamps did in the double pivot last season while contributing more to the attack since he is younger and can still make runs into the box.

Completely off mate. Marchisio is absolutely nothing like either. If anything he is more like a Ballack. He does the defensive work very well (not necessarily the tackling, but he always covers and puts in the miles) and his contribution to the attack is often meaning full. He is simply a typical (and very good) box-to-box midfielder. His biggest asset, imo, is that his technical abilities are among the best in the world. His technique in passing, heading and especially shooting is the kind that coaches show youth players videos of to teach them how it should be done. I think he would make a very valuable asset to any team. Too bad he will never leave Juve. EDIT: Example of the technique I was talking about:

I'm not sure about Josh. There is Cleverly and Wilshere and others ahead of him. Really it would be a good thing if he doesn't go. He had a brilliant pre-season last time around (which people have forgotten too easily), hopefully he'll have a similar one and get some decent chances with the team.

I wondered whom he was rooting for. He did after all play for both sides. But if memory serves, his time at Munich wasn't his favorite part of his career.

That just reminded me of how good it felt to beat them

Tbf, the Telegraph usually trustworthy.

Strictly off topic, but do you think we can play with a double pivot role without drogba as effectively as we did last season? The double pivot worked brilliantly for us because Lamps and Mikel played the role perfectly which gave us a great solidity in the defense, but one of the reasons as well that it worked offensively is the relation between Lampard and Drogba imo. If you review the last 10 matches or so, half of our goals started with a long ball from Lampard/Mikel towards the attack. Can we replicate that with Torres instead of Drogba? I have my doubts.

Whilst I see your point, Romelu has already proved himself in a league with somewhat slower tempo and less physicality. We know he can bully weak defenders, but we need to test him in the PL so he can learn to out-run and out-muscle the likes of Vidic. He won't be able to do that in Denmark.

According to the Telegraph, Chelsea made an 'informal' inquiry about Luka. Whatever that means..

If he's smart he'll turn it down. He'll need to make a claim for that lone striker role if he is to get the minutes he wants next season.

Not that big a deal since his role in the team is secured. But playing in the Olympics is a once in a lifetime opportunity for Ryan, he deserves it.

He's included in the GB Olympics team! What a year it has been for Ryan, very happy for him.

It is easy to say that Lampard, Cahill...etc clearly had the potential in retrospective. They, like Morrison, had many doubters when we signed them, just take a look at the first couple of pages of the Garry Cahill thread. Also about him being 26, Cahill is 27. And, if memmory serves, Drogba was also 26 when we signed him.

Pinaar charged after assaulting the son of a minister: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-2165882/Steven-Pienaar-charged-assault.html?ITO=socialnet-twitter-dmailsports We dodged a bullet with this one.

Brilliant as always SeB. We need more scouts like you at Chelsea. Imo, this is exactly the type signings we need to make. I know it's not exactly "glamorous", but you can't afford to only buy players who cost more than 20m and you don't even have to. Cahill is proof to that. Another player I would love to have here to fill that CM spot is James McCarthy. He plays a bit deeper than Morrison, but is very composed and already has about 70 PL appearances at the young age of 22.

Not necessarily. Falcao?

^^ No, no. I don't want to see Turnbull in a Chelsea shirt any time soon. Why not give Blackman a shot?

I completely agree, some people, me included, are very defensive about their opinions. But to be fair, that madrid fan had it coming, users tried to debate with him but he just said that their opinion was wrong that only he has the intellectual abilities to be logical I apologize if my post contributed to the xenophobia, but in my defense I did try to to move the "argument" to the pub thread.

http://www.goal.com/en/news/2898/euro-2012/2012/06/27/3203159/meireles-urges-portugal-to-emulate-chelsea?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter

I think Rami's ideal position is CM in 4-3-3. In a double pivot role, however, I have my doubts over him because of his passing skills and his forward runs will make life much difficult for Mikel (the player next to him). Though he has never been tried there so he could prove me wrong. I can't see him at rightback either because he simply doesn't have the experience to play there. I think RDM has a lot to try during pre-season.

To get this back on topic, where do you see Rami playing next season in the 4-2-3-1? On the wing where he played since RDM took charge or centrally despite not being tested there?

Let's take this elsewhere. Meet me in http://forum.talkche...890#entry448178