CHOULO19

I don't claim to have all his matches last season but I watched him a fair amount of times and I stand by what I said. Hazards passing is good, but not exactly brilliant. I think he lacks Mata's vision and ability to play passes that fool the defense. In France, as in our first match vs the Sounders, he did very well in the hole because his close control allowed him to get past the midfielder marking him and run on the defense. I don't think he will be able to that in the PL especially against teams who put 8-9 players behind the ball.

As I said he always looks to dribble first almost instinctively. He can always do so on the wing, but he will find dribbling very hard in the center especially against teams that defend in numbers. Even he realized that in yesterdays match and started to drift out wide in the last 15 mins after only managing to create a single chance through the middle (The foul he got on the edge of the pen area at the start of the second half) Care to explain why you think otherwise instead of just stating that it's not true?

I don't care if he wants to play there, Hazard just can't create for others when he plays centrally because, by nature, he instinctively looks to dribble first and not pass.

I thought Lukaku was terrible up until Torres came on..

That was never a foul for Torres.

I agree about Mata, but have never seen any of the others take a FK so I can't judge. Never seen him take a FK but so far he always backs off from FKs for some reason.

Would you rather Luiz take them? That's our only other option unfortunately.

Hahahaha Mikel almost scoring

0-0. We're dominated possession but neither team has had any chances. Very cagey half.

Terry has been our most likely player to score. Says a lot about our attackers in this half.

Great defending by Brana. Meireles' short range passing accuracy depresses me!

Need to speed up the tempo a bit if we're going to score.

Terry should've scored there.

@, still not working mate?

Nour FC:

Yes it does. Just like every player ever signed in history has had the pressure from the media and fans to justify the fee that the club has paid for him. What can I say? Life isn't fair.

@, did you get a notification? Edit: Looks like it's not working for you Kez...

Barely got 48

http://www1.skysports.com/football/news/11668/7944949/?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter

Speaking of Chelsea vs Milan in the USA: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v753atCKK50 (I've been waiting for this match just to post that goal )

Not a bug or a complaint, but could a mod please start a topic for the Milan match? There isn't one yet. Thanks

It looks very much like him, but I can't be 100% sure.

I have to say I saw this coming. But surely they're have to charge Anton as well.

He made his name because he has world-class passing skills, vision and intelligence, that has nothing to do with were he is playing. Yes he was deployed on the left at the start of last season but always "naturally" drifted centrally. Even under AVB, whenever we used 4-2-3-1 (which was AVB's plan 'B') Mata played in the hole because it was obvious (to me at least) that on the wing he more often than not leaves Cole on his own defensively. Even on the offense, despite having exceptional dribbling skills, he lacks the pace to beat most defenders on the flanks especially on counter attacks.

Or if he is anything like Oscar, it'll be official by monday