OneMoSalah

Definite downgrade on Courtois but a very good goalkeeper. Probably England’s best imo.

If he is as good as they say we should sign him. They are saying he will be in the Brazil World Cup squad for sure at the rate he’s going so we should to try get a deal done for the summer in January if possible, probably be our best bet. No coincidence Barca are after him either.

It doesn’t matter. Players have chosen other clubs and managers over us before. Benjamin Mendy said he had other offers (which we were one) and would only leave Monaco for City and Pep. There’s others as well clearly and with every target of the stature of a Sandro or a Mendy or a Lukaku they will have more than one suitor. The thing I meant as well is that Manchester United won’t hesitate to sign Sandro at the drop of a hat in January for £60m+ if Mourinho wants him. Like backing him with £100m Pogba, £75m Lukaku and Zlatan with huge wages despite being well in his mid 30s in the past. Conte obviously wanted Alex Sandro and still wants him but do you think upstairs will be willing to green light a potential £60m+ January move if that’s what’s Juventus want (nobody is cheap these days yet alone in January)? That is what I’m not so sure about. Time and time again in recent years we’ve shown recently that the club has a agenda regarding FFP, signing promising younger players instead of more developed ones and following a transfer strategy with targets that have clearly been followed by the club since before AVBs appointment.

If he really wants to leave Juventus and we lose out on signing him to United I will go mad. Fucking Mourinho.

At least he’s honest and to be frank hes correct. Bad summer, bad start v Burnley, loss to Palace and now this along with City’s current form and their late goal habit (regardless of the result vs United) all but confirms it. Think the players deserve much more criticism than manager considering he changed system twice, threw Moses, Pedro and Willian on and nobody looked interested or affected game any more than before. We had 0 shots on target in second half despite 70% possession, which says it all. Either too many touches or too many passes. Or no runs or nothing was quick enough. Couple that together with lack of energy. Poor. Can’t see Conte admitting we’re out of title race going down well with upstairs but it also strengthens his hand and makes January an intriguing month because if the club dont back Conte I think it will be pretty clear he’s going in the summer. He’s been saying stuff about recruitment/playing same players every 3 days for close to 2 months now and if the club really wants him to stay he holds all the aces, he can go through the chain of command and say look we need to buy players 1 2 and 3 or 4 5 and 6 to ensure we are more competitive (I’m sure he was already like that this summer when you consider who we were all linked with but Chelsea is Chelsea).

To be fair we’ve played played a fair amount of games over the last 10-15 years against better opposition in a similar way defending with lots of numbers and good organisation. In my eyes it’s not really dirty.. when done right, it’s very effective. No disrespect meant but end of the day winning 1-0 like that is still winning 1-0. Id rather of seen us get points playing like that than getting 0 and playing like whoever or whatever. No doubt about it West Ham worked harder than us I felt and they ultimately deservedly to win, as well as looking more dangerous than we did despite having the ball a lot less, they could have got a second if not for a pass played a second too late and arguably should of had a penalty for handball. Moratas miss was bad. He has so much time and he just doesn’t realise but wow not to hit the target from there... still we hardly created any chances but for me the effort and will to compete for first and second balls today cost us, West Ham won more or less everything from knockdowns and whatever else. Little things like that but makes a huge difference. Anyway it’s only one game. One game doesn’t matter much in the grand scheme of things. Particularly when we know everyone competing in that top 4/top 6 bar City will still drop between 5-10 points somewhere this season. On the bright side all the hardcore Chelsea fan twitter accounts like carefree daily and whatever else are losing their rag and posting utter pish which will cheer me up because some of the stuff is ridiculously funny.

Really frustrated with Hazard, Morata, Zappacosta, Christensen and a few others so far in the second half. Christensen has looked asleep at times and scared of Arnautovic and Antonio. Zappacosta awful, poor final ball every time more or less. Second half Hazard and Morata not really offering much although at least both have the quality to do something which goes for them. No passion from the players at all though, Conte has made every sub he can too, can’t do much more. Also what the fuck was Bakayokos performance all about? Utter shite

Young player, new contract... so is it safe to assume he’s likely going out on loan in January? Similar things happened with Ruben, Zouma and Tammy... IIRC. Would be the best thing for him. If not unsure why club would have him as a higher priority than Eden, Cesc or Tibo with regards to sorting out a new deal. But this is Chelsea and we do a lot of shit that doesn’t make sense.

One thing he has is real pace. Unsure about much else not seen a lot of him. Not a massive goal scorer either looking at stats but a 20 y/o wide player maybe not most important thing.

I liked Chalobah. Showed in limited minutes last season he was dependable and could help shore up the middle of the park in matches but for a team looking to win, to improve and compete is that necessarily worth keeping when he wants to leave and you think your getting a guy who was one of the more impressive CM players in Europe who was vital for Monaco in their CL run? Not sure, it’s hard as well to judge now because Nathaniel is injured at Watford, after a decent start from what I hear but I’m sure come the end of the season we’ll know. I hope in the long run Baka turns out to be worth it. I think Chalobah would have stayed if he was told he’d get more game time, knew Matic was going to be sold (was surprised we sold him myself) and that Conte was going to change to 352. Instead of Drinkwater, he’d of been 35M cheaper that could have been used elsewhere although DD has looked good in limited minutes but I wouldn’t say we’re missing Chalobah as we have some options in MF (maybe could of done with somebody more like Cesc) and again I hope in the long run Baka will be a better player just to justify buying him and selling Chalobah but known Chelsea’s luck with former players who knows 😂

Yeah the wing backs do need some changes in terms of the quality. I agree with you regarding Moses thought he was good as well but it’s a nightmare to buy wing backs because it’s not a typical traditional position so to speak like a winger or a fullback. Sandro would be good with Alonso as back up yes but I still think that Batshuayi, Willian, Pedro to an extent (although he looks good as an impact player) can all be improved on for sure as well. Even as squad players I think they can be improved upon. Although it’s hard to get guys willing to be squad players and be at a high level. Tonight though, finishing and good goalkeeping kept us from winning, I think we created enough chances for sure.

Jesus. Don’t say this shite has begun? One miss? Was bound to happen eventually but yeah... For that chance Oblak made a good save, sure we would of all done something differently in that position based or whatever because we all seen it live on the tele and thought he should of scored but thats life. The keeper was really quick to come out to him which means Morata has to make up his mind and Oblak made himself really big, which I thought was good goalkeeping. He would probably score that 9/10 times I imagine. Oblak is a top keeper, fair enough people would back somebody to score from that position but I don’t think it was that bad, he’s hit the target and it’s definitely going in if the keeper doesn’t save it. Hardly a crisis. You’d think he was Demba Ba with that last comment about thinking he won’t make it as a top striker.

He needs dropped for Drinkwater or we go back to 343 for a while. He has got some ability but he’s playing so poorly after making some audacious claim about being better than a lot of French MF players. He clearly has self belief but I feel he’s trying to hard, it’s time for him to go back to basics, win tackles, win headers, keep it simple with the ball etc. Too often he looks to over complicate things and isn’t having a positive effect on the match. Since that United performance he has been pretty awful, has he won a tackle without fouling more than once in a game this season? He was caught sleeping for the goal tonight, fair enough that can happen to the best or worst of players but his performance itself was pretty poor other than one good pass into the box for Eden in first half and a few tackles which he somehow didn’t gift a foul to Atletico. I’m sure he’ll turn the tide eventually but this season is going to be one of transition for him. Keep seeing Ruben being mentioned but it’s not even relevant mentioning him because these guys are two different players. A 8 and a 10.

Honestly I thought Zappa was good tonight, probably his best game for us. Wanted to take his marker on and get a shot off. Sure he didn’t cross as often as he would of done if he was on the right but he looked like he had purpose when he got the ball, especially in the first half. I think the need for more quality in the final third is well known but it’s more than just the wing backs although upgrades in these positions are still needed but Willian, Bakayoko, Pedro, Batshuayi are all hit and miss in the final third also but for me it was bad finishing/good goalkeeping that cost us more tonight.

His form at the moment is great, he’s on a wee run again where he’s influencing games big time but I think talks of challenging Messi/Ronaldo is getting ahead of ourselves. Do people think he’s really playing as good as Messi or Ronaldo? Or can challenge guys who have been scoring 40-50 goals a year for nearly 10 seasons? I mean for me Eden is world class, more than likely the best player in the PL but he is not at that Messi/Ronaldo level, even if their aging. He’s in the bracket just below with Neymar and a few others for me. I just dont think he’s got the drive the likes of Messi, Ronaldo or even Neymar have to be that number 1 player or number 1 goal scorer or number 1 assister or whatever which is a shame. But on the other hand if we are talking about importance he is arguably the most important player in Europe because imagine how poor we’d be without him and how much we would struggle.

Kessie has been extremely poor of late. Milan haven’t even signed him fully he’s still there on loan with obligation to buy option. Pretty sure Conti has been out for a while with a long injury.

take it with a pinch of salt

Acknowledging how they are good players who would benefit, like Hazard has, from having somebody good to link up with? How is that overrating them? I never said they were better than Cesc or Hazard and yes I’m aware they haven’t been as good as the start of the season but they all offer something and give United decent depth in wide positions. Also Mkhitaryan started this season on fire.

Yeah it’s weird. I generally thought that Morata would of been his first choice as he signed him at Juventus, although he didn’t coach him but still maybe he wasn’t exactly sure how Morata would do being first choice playing every week as he has been a impact sub or squad player more often than not. Who knows, thought the club were pushing for Lukaku as opposed to Conte.

Without a doubt. I’d hate to see what Morata could do and bring to their team with the depth of attacking players United have like Mata, Martial, Rashford and Mkhitiryian. Imagine they had a CF who could properly link with those players (probably Zlatan can but surely he will be 2nd choice), would make a hell of a difference. For the money we paid for Morata (or would of paid for Lukaku), it’s so clear how much better of a deal we got. Obviously strikers are there to score goals yes but Morata has so much more to offer.

Another hugely talented midfield player in Seria A, playing for Lazio, who have been progressing nicely under Inzaghi the last few seasons. A 22 y/o, Serbian central midfield player with good physical and technical attributes, he can also play as a 10. According to WhoScored he’s played 11 matches for Lazio as a CM this season, has 5 goals and 2 assists. Seen Lazio-Sampdoria (mainly to watch Torreira) and he looked impressive, scored a goal, didn’t lose the ball much, won a lot of aerial duels, drove his team forward as much as he could and mucked in defensively too. Fair enough only Sampdoria but he has been getting rave reviews after last season and was linked with Juventus, PSG, Man City, Man United and Liverpool (who tried to sign him) in the summer. One to keep an eye on for sure.

Real Madrid and Barcelona even if their coming to the end of their cycle, although I wouldn’t say that necessarily because they will always be at the top of European football, will always be among the first choice for sought after players at that top tier level like Dybala. All your traditional big clubs like Barca, Real, Bayern, United, Juventus.. they all have that advantage over other clubs, particularly Barca and Real with South American players. I genuinely see Dybala going to Barca in the next 2 or 3 years. Crazy they didn’t go for him this summer in all fairness once they lost Neymar but fitting him in their system maybe not easiest part.

Not sure what he was doing for that long ball to Gayle before the Newcastle goal but other than that very good performance. The moment where he went on that run and played a perfect pass to Moses was great play.

Really struggled to see his talent shine through in the matches I’ve seen Swansea and him in. I generally think he had one really good season at Benfica and moved too soon. Either that or he’s a one season wonder because he showed absolutely nothing at Bayern (okay he was not playing regularly, bound to not help) and is showing nothing at Swansea. People have said about the quality of team mates but that is clutching at straws and a very poor excuse for a box to box midfielder who looks like he can’t seem to pass, shoot or tackle without fouling. Think he should really be looking to go back to Benfica next season on loan. Its a pity I thought he would of been a good player and thought we should of maybe looked towards him in the summer but I’m so glad we didn’t. He has probably been the most disappointing transfer in Europe, never mind just England. One step forwards two steps backwards so far in his career.

It’s harder to buy in January, most clubs don’t want to sell their better players in the winter, it’s always harder to get suitable replacements as well. Fair enough he’s been a bit of a pain for them but it doesn’t always make clubs open to selling for less, look at the whole Costa situation here, clubs don’t want to lose quality players for less money. If a club is desperate enough to sign a player the selling clubs take advantage of that. Even Dembele in the summer once there was talk of Barca bids, he was fined and had a few falling outs on the way as he didn’t show up for training before they sold him for like over €100 million because Barcelona were desperate to sign him. Sure the transfer market has gone mental but they bid much much lower at first.